Legends of Duel Academy
by Seos Kannenth
Summary: A boy called Rory starts life at Duel academy, and is soon taken under the wing of a prominant duellist, Damien Cavourre. Can Richard and Rory prepare their decks in time to save the world? PLEASE READ AND REVIEW! The Final chapter is now up!
1. The Wave Lord

Rory sat in his room. He was staring at his deck, once more contemplating how to change his deck for the better. He had all the rare cards he could ever hope for, but no matter what he tried, he could never be a successful duellist.

Rory was a boy of 15, and had short black hair, with brown eyes. He was in his first year at Duel Academy, and had been placed in Ra Yellow house, despite only passing the entrance exam with a couple of hundred life points remaining.

It was the first week, and the large majority of the school were talking about how some young punk had defeated Dr. Crowler in a Duel. His name was Jaden Yuki, and Rory was considering asking him for advice on his new deck strategy.

As Rory thought about this, the bell rang, signalling the start of his first lesson of the day, the history of duelling, with Professor Banner. He rose to leave the room, scooping up his deck, when a small piece of paper fell through his dormitory door.

He walked over, and picked it up. It was a plain piece of paper, with the words 'You have been chosen' scribbled on it in black pen. Rory further examined the card, but it gave no details of what he had been chosen for, as it only listed a time and place, other than the scrawl. It told him to go to the obelisk arena at midnight, and also informed him to bring a deck.

It was a few hours later that anything else of interest happened. As he was leaving a boring lecture for lunch, he saw three boys in Slifer red jackets walking down the corridor. Rory immediately recognised that one of them, with brown hair and eyes, was Jaden Yuki, the duellist who had taken down Doctor Crowler.

As a pose to the other Ras and Obelisks that saw him, yelling insults at Jaden, Rory charged forward, pushing the smaller blue haired boy beside Jaden out of the way, and forcing his way in front of the bemused boy.

"You, you're the one that took down Dr. Crowler!" said Rory to Jaden, interrupting his now squealing friend.

"Yeah, I guess so." Muttered Jaden "Why, who are you?"

"My name is Rory Lionheart, and I was wondering how you designed your deck?"

"Well, um." Began Jaden rubbing his chin. "I guess I just liked the cards. You've got to play from your heart, or you'll never win."

Rory stood open mouthed. He had expected a detailed description of how to design the perfect deck. Instead, he had received useless second-hand advice. "And you beat Dr. Crowler?" he roared, completely astounded that such a pathetic duellist could have succeeded against a renowned Duelling professor like Crowler.

That evening, Rory lay at his desk once more, staring at his cards and trying to figure out what he was doing wrong. He had all the right cards. In fact, he had spent hundreds of pounds trying to perfect his deck, yet to no success. It did not matter; his family were rich, which was probably one of the reasons that he had not been placed in Slifer.

Suddenly, he remembered the strange card he had received earlier that night. He checked his watch. It was 11.35, and the Obelisk arena was on the other side of the campus, so he would have to hurry to get there on time.

It was just before midnight when he arrived at the arena, but he was baffled. The arena had no lights on, and there was no sound emanating from it. Could it have been a prank? Rory did not know whether to go inside or not. He glanced again at the card. To use the arena, an Obelisk must have organised this, so they would definitely be able to help him make a deck. On the other hand, if it was a prank, and Rory was caught by a teacher, he could have been expelled for using the arena facilities out of hours.

Rory contemplated the possibilities once more, and entered through the tall marble arches. The first thing he noticed when he entered was that sound-proof walls had been placed in between the entrance way, which explained why the arena had been completely silent.

The actual arena was massive, and there were many duels taking place all over it. In each case, an obelisk was fighting a Ra student, but each of the Ras was failing to defeat their opponents. In the stands, there were at least twenty second year students, monitoring the duels, and giving levels to the duellists.

Unfortunately, the Ras were leaving as fast as they were entering. Rory entered the stands, and approached the closest 'proctor'.

"Excuse me, my name is Rory. I was invited." He said.

The proctor replied very matter of fact, telling him to wait at the arena side. After a couple of minutes, the proctor signalled for him to enter the arena. He walked forward, and his opponent grinned, placing his deck in his duel disk, and preparing to duel.

Suddenly, a shout echoed throughout the stadium, from one of the second years monitoring the battles. He had yelled for the matches to stop, and this proctor was not taking notes, appearing to be the lead. He slowly manoeuvred down towards the ring side, where he pulled the student opposite Rory away, and simply stating "I shall take this one."

As he took up position, he asked "What is your name?"

"Uh, my name is Rory, I was wondering-" but Rory was cut off in mid sentence. The boy opposite had raised his finger, signalling silence.

"All duels are now to cease. This duel will take prime importance. I will need the whole field." He bellowed, with immediate response, as the field was clear in less than a minute.

"My name is Damien Cavourre." He began, attaching his duel disk, and inserting his deck. "I am the one who organised these matches, and I am your opponent this evening."

Rory took this chance to look at his opponent properly. He was taller than Rory, and had slightly longer brown hair. He was wearing a large Obelisk blazer, and tight black jeans.

"Prepare to duel!" he yelled, and the newly assembled students filling the stands went quiet. Rory slotted his deck in to his duel disk, and replied in an assertive tone "I'm ready when you are."

Both players began with 4000 life points, and Rory drew the first card. He had a range of monsters, but decided to play defensively to see what his opponent used. He set his monster 'white ninja' and ended his turn.

"Wow, you really know how to duel." Mocked Damien "One card on the first turn. Clap clap. I have no idea how to top that."

He drew a card. He scanned his hand, and then quickly placed a monster in defence mode. It was mother Grizzly, and Rory knew that if it was destroyed in battle, its effect would activate. He grinned. Thanks to his white ninja's flip effect that would not be a problem.

"I'll see your monster and raise you one face-down." Said his cocky foe, placing one card face down, and its image now appearing behind his enormous black bear.

Rory glanced at his hand again. He had to gain field advantage, but had no spell or trap cards that would help him too much, so he moved his hand over his monster field instead.

"I flip my face-down monster in to attack position!" he cried across the arena. "And that means its effect activates."

"Oh, so my mother grizzly is destroyed, and I cannot replace it. Well done, but next time you won't be so lucky." Interrupted his opponent, still feeling like he was in charge.

Rory smirked. He could now overpower the field, and take out most of Damien's life points. "Ok, I summon mystic clown in attack mode." He stated, as his ninja was rapidly joined on the field by a grotesque clown. "And now both my monsters-"

"Are destroyed!" shrieked Damien, as a trap card on his side of the field flipped face up. It was torrential tribute, meaning that when any monster is summoned, every monster on the field is destroyed.

"No!" Rory shouted, as his monsters spiralled in to the graveyard. "That means that I have no defences.

"Correct," said Damien, drawing a card. "And that means that I can gain counter-offensive." He placed a monster card on the field, which resembled an enormous snake with glowing scales.

"Now, my little 7 coloured fish has only got 1800 attack points on his own," Damien mocked. "But if I play this, then he becomes a little stronger."

As he said this, he played a field spell card. Suddenly, water gushed in to the arena, filling the stadium completely. This increased Damien's creature's attack power to 2000. "This 'A legendary ocean' card is very useful." Damien continued. "It not only increases all of my water monsters attack points by 200, but it also decreases each of their levels by 1."

Next, the fish rammed in to Rory, and his life point counter rapidly spun down, lowering to 2000. "And it shows." Damien laughed.

"What shows?"

"That my theory is correct. This school has not only got a waste of duellists in Slifer, but the same applies to those in Ra. Only Obelisk students are worthy to study at this illustrious academy." At this, he threw yet another card face down.

"Oh, really? Then How about I teach you that you are wrong." Rory said now enraged.

As he drew, he looked at his hand. He needed to think if he was going to win this now. He had just drawn a card called 'de-spell'. It allowed him to destroy 1 spell card on the field.

"Ok, then. I will start by using de-spell," he said, holding up the card. "And it destroys your a legendary ocean."

A magical energy glowed around the arena. Suddenly, the water shattered, lowering the colourful fish's attack down to 1800.

"Next, I will summon La Jinn, mystical genie of the lamp in attack mode!" As Rory said this, a large green genie appeared on the arena, opposite the long snake-like fish. "Now La Jinn, attack his fish!"

The two creatures flew forward towards each other and an enormous cloud of dust expanded across the arena, shrouding the combatants. When it cleared, both had disappeared.

"What a shame, little Ra. Looks like you've miscalculated again. I use call of the haunted." Laughed Damien.

Once more, Damien's serpent rose back to the field. Its master drew a card, before playing it face down.

"Now I'll attack." The obelisk stated simply, as his fish hammered in to Rory, once more lowering his life points greatly.

"Don't think you've won yet. I'm still in this one." Rory said, pulling another card from his deck. Now, Rory had just drawn a card that could save him.

"First, I'll play this Dian Keto the cure master." He yelled to his opponent "which increases my life points to 1200. Next, I'll play fissure, which toasts that little fish of yours."

Suddenly, Damien's monster exploded. "If you're done-" Damien said placing his hand on his deck, before being interrupted by Rory.

"Sorry. I'm not done yet. Next up, I remove from play the white ninja and mystic clown in my graveyard from play, allowing me to summon my chaos emperor dragon – envoy of the end!"

As Rory bellowed this, the arena shook under pressure, as an enormous dragon appeared alongside Rory. "Now, my monster, attack!"

The dragon let out a burst of searing energy that rocketed in to Damien, lowering his life points to 1000. "But that's not all!" began Rory "Next I'll use my dragon's effect. That means that by paying 1000 life points, I can destroy every card on the field and in both of our hands, and deal 300 damage to you for each one!"

"So, got this all planned out then?" asked Damien "But you've once more forgotten. I have a trap card!"

At this, Damien face down card lifted. "I use divine wrath!" Damien began to laugh "That means that your effect is negated, and your dragon is destroyed!"

"No!" Rory screamed, his dragon being struck by a bolt of lightning and vanishing.

"And all I had to do was discard a card." Damien said, placing one card from his hand in to his graveyard. "And now on my turn, that card can return due to its effect."

Suddenly, a small frog-like creature emerged on to Damien's side of the field. "Next, I will use big wave small wave!" he bellowed, as an enormous wave crashed on to the field, destroying his frog. "This allows me to tribute all the water monsters on my side of the field, and special summon the same number of water monsters from my hand. So I summon, Ocean Dragon Lord – Neo Daedalus!"

At this, an enormous serpent crashed on to the field, charging forward, and wiping out the remainder of Rory's Life points.

He slumped, a frown on his face. He truly had believed that he was going to win the match, but he had been tricked. If he had not tried to use Chaos Emperor's effect, then he would have won. As he contemplated this, he could hear footsteps as his opponent approached him.

He rose to face him, and noticed a hand, protruding from Damien's arm. He placed his inside of it, and the two duellists shook hands, in a friendly manner.

"Nice Duel!" said Damien, continuing to shake Rory's hand. "You fit the criteria perfectly."

"Criteria?"

"Yes. Dr. Crowler could not have possibly lost to such a pathetic duellist as that Jaden Yuki, so some of the other second year Obelisks and I decided to defeat him in a duel. We also decided that an Obelisk would be too obvious a victory. So we settled with a Ra. You have what it takes to become a prominent duellist. All you must do is solve that anger problem of yours. When I told you that I thought Ras were inferior, you fell right in to my trap."

"Wait, so what do you want me to do?"

"You will challenge Jaden Yuki to a duel. But more importantly, you will convince him to wager his attendance at the academy. You shall succeed, and this plague that threatens our pecking order shall be eradicated. Are you up to the challenge?"

Rory stood on the arena, putting this together in his mind. This was a chance. A chance to prove that he was worthy of success. He could perfect his deck. But it would be against his morals. He would have to oppose those who were weak, and he would destroy what he had always believed in. But maybe that is what he needed. To destroy himself, and create a new Rory, one who could be a champion.

Rory turned back towards Damien, and opened his mouth, emitting only a single word. He adopted a loud, clear voice, and he said "Yes."


	2. Obelisk Opression

Rory sat on his bed, thinking. He had just had his field test. He was worried. Not about the test, as he had managed to ace it, thanks to his newly built deck, but instead about Jaden.

The Boy had been encountered by a VWXYZ Dragon catapult cannon, but had managed to defeat it, thanks to a winged kuriboh level 10, which Rory had not prepared for. He would once more need to create a new deck to defeat it.

He needed a new card, but the booster packs had all been bought on the day of the field test, so there was no chance that he could get one. He needed something that could stop the threat of Level 10 Kuriboh, whilst taking Jaden down.

Suddenly, there was a knock at his door. He went to open it, and when he did, found Damien there, holding a small white letter.

"Rory, I heard that you are planning to challenge Jaden today." He stated pushing past Rory and entering the room.

"Yes, I was thinking of challenging him at lunch, and duelling him on the grass." Rory stammered, still struggling to believe that Damien had just forced his way inside.

"Excellent. That means that you can gather a crowd." Damien Began "I hope you have prepared a way to deal with Winged Kuriboh."

"No. I was just trying to think. I don't know any way to stop it from using that effect."

"Well I do." Damien stated, passing the envelope to Rory. "It did not take me long. This card has sufficient strength to take down that Slifer's life points, and can also stop Winged Kuriboh from harming you."

"Ok. How do I use its effect?" Rory queried

"Oh, don't worry about that. Just make sure it gets on to the field, and it will do the rest." Damien replied, quickly leaving the room, and not allowing any response from Rory.

Rory looked at the envelope, and stood still for a moment, before wandering back to his bed, and sitting down. He investigated the envelope, turning it over in his hands, before gently running his finger across the seal holding it closed, and reaching for his letter opener. As he did this, he saw a strange insignia upon the seal. There was a great demonic creature, covered in thick armour and great spikes.

He thought nothing of it, and sliced through the seal, opening the envelope. Inside was the card that Damien had spoken of, and as Rory was about to look at it, a thunderous ringing erupted. He looked up at his clock, and suddenly was struck by the fact that it was time for class. He slipped the card quickly in to his deck, and ran out of his room.

At lunch, Rory emerged from his classroom, ten minutes later than he should have done, as he had been given a detention for his lateness, and only managed to escape by telling Crowler he was terribly sorry and that he too agreed being late was rude.

As he left the classroom, he began to wonder to himself where Jaden would be. As he thought this, he heard an enormous crash as a duel erupted in front of him, between a slifer using a warrior deck and an Obelisk using a spellcaster deck. The Obelisk would clearly win, but Rory had beaten them both before. He did not even know why the boy was in Obelisk, though he assumed it was something to do with family connections. In fact, half of the obelisks weren't even good duellists. Rory was surprised at how corrupt the school was.

As Rory was thinking this, he looked up, and saw Jaden's friend with blue hair. He ran forward, and grabbed the boy's arm.

"Hey, you, where's your friend, Jaden?"

"I don't know." Replied the small boy "He ran off to duel some cocky Obelisks, and I can't find him."

"How about we find him then?" Rory proposed "My name is Rory."

"Hi, I'm Syrus."

Syrus and Rory ran off, and began to head towards the beach, which was where Syrus said Jaden had been going when he had last seen him. As they arrived, they saw the end of a duel taking place, between Jaden and an Obelisk.

As they attempted to approach, two Obelisks blocked the path, pushing them backwards.

"You two stay back," One of them said "We're going to prove that Jaden beating Crowler and Chazz was just a fluke, and you aren't coming past!"

"What if I were to beat you in a duel?" Questioned Rory

"Yeah, then we'd let you through, But there is no way that you could defeat us both in a duel."

"Well, maybe Syrus here can make it a fair match." Rory mocked "Or at least make you think it is a fair match, so you don't look as bad when you lose."

The two Obelisks were now too angry to let Rory get off without a duel, and rapidly produced their duel disks.

"Um, Rory, are you sure this is such a good idea?" asked Syrus "I mean, I'm not that good a duellist."

"Don't worry. I could take these too on at once. Just make sure you don't get in my way!"

Each player adopted a position atop a rock on the beach, forming a square as a duel field. One of the two Obelisks, Mathew, took the first turn, instantly summoning a Goblin attack force.

"Fear my powerful monster!" he cried "2300 attack points on the first turn will teach you scum to know your place!"

As he ended his turn, he placed one face-down card and used final attack orders.

"Now my power is twice as deadly, as all face-up monsters are forced in to attack mode!" cackled the Obelisk.

Rory casually drew a card from his deck, placing 3 face-down and setting a monster.

"Now my good friend," Rory said to Mathew "That final attack orders does not effect my face-down creature, but not only that, but if your incredible monster attacks, it is forced in to defence position. It also has 0 defence. A slightly less impressive look at your field."

As Rory said this, Mathew nearly fell from his rock, startled by Rory's comment. He quickly shook this off however, as his partner drew a card from his deck.

"Ok," said Woody, the second obelisk "I'll start by using my monsters effect. I summon Fusilier Dragon, the dual mode beast in attack mode!"

"Ah, so you can special summon your dragon, but it loses half its attack. So once more, you still have nothing impressive." Rory ridiculed

"Oh, really," said Woody "then how about this? I use metamorphosis on my dragon, and since it still has 7 stars, I can summon the last warrior from another planet."

"Not all that amazing. It has only got 2350 attack, and you have to destroy all of your monsters to summon it."

"But you're forgetting my monster's other effect." Began Woody "I can stop you from summoning any more monsters whilst he remains on the field. And when that monster of yours is destroyed, we'll have this game set!"

"Ah, but when you attack, I chain Ordeal of a traveller." Rory laughed. "This allows me to return that monster to your fusion deck, given that you guess what type of card this is incorrectly."

"Ok then, it's a spell." Woody stated

"So close, but it is not." Rory replied, turning round the card to reveal that it was an opticlops. "This means that your monster is repelled back to your fusion deck!"

"Fine then. I'll just place one card face-down" finished Woody

"Ok then, my turn." Muttered Syrus, pondering his move. "I guess that I'll play my Gyroid in attack position, and attack you directly."

"Stop there." Chuckled Woody "I activate Wall of revealing light! This means that you cannot attack with any monster that has less attack than how many life points I sacrifice. I sacrifice 3000, and this is a permanent trap, so you're going to have problems getting through."

Syrus shrank. He was on the brink of tears, remembering a past duel that had gone similarly. He moaned. "I guess I'll just play two cards face-down."

Mathew drew another card. "So, the little baby is afraid of our wall of light." He mocked. "Well, prepare to get really scared!"

"Stop." Began Rory, talking in a calm voice. "You aren't thinking of leaving yourself unguarded are you? Because, if you play a monster, attack, and are repelled by my Ordeal of a traveller, then we could easily finish you by destroying your card."

The Obelisk shook again. He moved his hand to another card and instead pulled out that one. "I activate heavy storm!" he yelled "It destroys every spell or trap card on the field. And that includes your ordeal of a traveller."

"And of course, your wall of revealing light." Rory smiled, as the hologram in front of his opponents dimmed.

"What!" yelled Woody and Mathew in unison "You tricked me!"

Rory laughed. "No. You fell for it."

"Ok, that doesn't matter! I summon a second goblin attack force and attack your gyroid!" Mathew stuttered

"Oh dear, must I point out everyone's mistakes?" Rory taunted "When your attack force attacks, it is turned in to defence mode. Not only that, but Gyroid won't be destroyed by your attack because of its effect."

As Syrus and Rory's life points went down by 1300, the two Obelisks started to look nervous. "I end my turn." Stammered Mathew cautiously, as if afraid that Rory might attack him.

"Ok then, this is the easy part." Rory laughed. "I summon my Opticlops, and I'll have gyroid attack your attack force."

In an explosion of smoke, the hologram disappeared. "And now I'll attack with Opticlops directly."

The two Obelisks' combined life points counter shook, as it crashed downwards, hitting zero.

"And that gentlemen, is what I call checkmate!" Rory said, stepping over the Obelisks, who were now collapsed on the floor, and proceeding towards Jaden, who had been watching the match, after winning his.

"Awesome duel, guys!" Jaden said, shaking Rory's hand as he approached. "Syrus, I've never seen you duel so well!"

"Cut the pleasantries." Rory snapped "I have been sent to prove that Slifer red is a pointless house, and that all of you Slackers should this day be removed from this school. I have been given a deal signed by Professor Crowler, Professor Satyr, and Chancellor Shepherd, saying that if I show that you are the best duellist in Slifer, and you are greatly inferior to me, your house may be destroyed."

"Well, I guess that I've proven that I'm the best duellist in Slifer." Jaden sighed "But I don't understand all of your long words."

Rory shook his head, muttering insults under his breath.

"There is one thing I understand though. This is a challenge, and as a good duellist, I can't refuse."

Rory laughed. "Right here, Right now, Slacker Scum!"

"Get your game on!" Jaden yelled back, both duellists Duel disks instantly snapping in to position.


	3. Battle for Slifer Red

Chapter 3

A small crowd had now gathered around Jaden and Rory, as they prepared for their duel. Amongst the crowd was Damien, sneakily dragging more people to watch the match.

Because of this, by the time the two duellists had taken up their positions, there were at least a hundred people watching the duel; Slifers, Ras and Obelisks.

"So, Mr Yuki, you think that you're such an amazing duellist? You take the first turn." Rory yelled to Jaden.

"Ok, then," The Slifer said, drawing a card from his deck, and immediately placing it on the field. "I summon Elemental Hero Burstinatrix in attack mode!"

Jaden ended his turn after this, placing a card face-down. Rory sniggered. He could already see that this was going to be easy.

Rory drew a card. As he did this, a voice erupted from the crowd, coming from a boy in a scruffy Ra yellow uniform and dark sunglasses. "You think you're so great! Why are you only playing a monster with 1200 attack? Rory could fry that!"

"Hey, don't say Burstinatrix is weak! She's one of my best monsters!" Argued Jaden

"If 1200 is 'one of your best', then this will really scare you!" Rory laughed, summoning Mystic clown in attack position. My clown has 1500 attack points. You said that 1200 was one of your best. 1500 is one of my worst. Mystic clown, attack and destroy Burstinatrix now!"

"Wait; hold plans for a funeral, because Burstinatrix is not dying today. You might want to plan one for your clown though, because I activate my face-down, sakuretsu armour!" Jaden began "When your monster attacks, it instantly destroys it!"

"Fine, my clown is gone, but more monsters shall follow. I'll leave it to your turn." Rory smirked.

"Are you smiling because you're enjoying this duel as much as me?" Asked Jaden, drawing a card from his deck. At this Rory frowned, glaring at his opponent. "Ok then. I use fusion gate! It's a field card, and is a gateway, so that my monsters can fuse."

As Jaden said this, the beach vanished from view, as the battle took place now upon an enormous arena of crossing green lines, hovering above a purple void.

"And now," Jaden continued "I'll use the ability of my fusion gate to fuse the Burstinatrix on my field, with the avian in my hand, to create Elemental hero Flame wingman!" Jaden adopted a booming voice on the last words, as an enormous green humanoid appeared, armed with a crimson arm, with a dragon's head instead of a hand.

"Now, my wingman is going to show you the back of his wing! Flame wingman, use your skydive scorcher!" As Jaden said this, Rory's life points rattled down rapidly to 1900 and an enormous fireball came flying from the monster's arm exploding inches from Rory's face.

"Now I'll throw down a face-down, and call it a turn!"

Once more, the Ra erupted from the crowd. "You idiot! You think you're so amazing; you only special summoned your wingman! You could have still summoned a monster." The Ra ran up behind Jaden instantly "Like this card here, W-i-ng-ed K-u-r-i-b-oh." The boy spelled the word out loudly, waving it at Jaden, before handing it back, and walking in to the crowd, lowering his sunglasses only for half a second to wink at Rory.

Damien had planned that. He had told Rory before that he would attempt to lessen Jaden's enthusiasm and inform Rory when winged Kuriboh was active. The plan wasn't working though. Jaden was so oblivious that he was still grinning, and was thanking the 'Ra' for his advice.

"My turn!" Yelled Rory "And I will set one monster in face-down defence position, as well as setting a spell or trap card. Now I shall end my turn!"

"Well, if you're out criticising people, shouldn't you be criticising him?" Jaden asked Damien. "I mean, he needs to gain back the offensive, or my wingman's power will fry him."

"There's more than one way to play, Slifer! He has created a mysterious field. His face down monster could have 3000 defence, or his face down card could be mirror force. You have to attack in to the darkness, unaware of the consequences." Replied Damien, still putting on a fake accent and pretending to be a Ra.

"Ok, well I draw a card!" said Jaden "And you have no idea what it is. It could be Exodia the forbidden one."

"Except it's not. Hence the 'forbidden'" Taunted Rory

"Yeah, I know." Giggled Jaden "I'll use it now! It's Pot of greed. This spell allows me to draw 2 more cards from my deck."

Jaden looked at the cards, briefly attempting to remember what they did. As he did this, Rory muttered under his breath, not believing that his opponent was so weak.

"Ok, I'll throw my monster down in face-down, defence position." Jaden began. "And now I'll have my wingman wipe out your face-down! Skydive scorcher!"

The enormous monster flew at Rory's face-down card, which appeared as a hologram seconds before the impact, launching a wave of shuriken outwards at Jaden's face-down. Rory's was a ninja in full white gear.

"My monster's effect activates, rookie." Rory laughed "And it blasts your second monster in to oblivion!"

As he said this, Jaden's face down shattered, only seconds before Rory's was destroyed. "Now my Wingman's superpower activates! It takes the attack points of your ninja, and tosses them straight back at your life points!"

Once more, Rory's life points dropped suddenly, this time stopping at 400. Rory sniggered. He had just drawn the card for his turn, and it was the one Damien had given him. He had no idea what it did, but he could summon it. The trap that he had set last turn was level conversion lab. That meant that if he could roll a dice on to a 2, 3 or 4, he could summon the monster.

"Ok, my rookie opponent." Rory grinned "Prepare to be destroyed! I activate 'Level Conversion lab'! This means that I take a dice and roll it. Than a selected monster in my hand's level becomes that until the end of the turn." Rory rolled the dice. It spun on the spot for a second, before settling on a 3. "Perfect. That means that my Invader of darkness becomes level 3. Now I can normal summon it straight to the field without tributes."

As Rory let out a burst of maniacal laughter, the arena shook, and an enormous cloaked warrior arose on Rory's side of the field.

"Sorry, but I chain call of the haunted." Jaden said, interrupting Rory's evil roar. "It allows me to bring back one of my monsters in attack position. And I choose Winged Kuriboh! It was the monster sent to the graveyard by white ninja's effect. But I'm not done. I also use Transcendent wings! This allows me to tribute my-"

"This allows you no such thing!" Interrupted Damien again, this time with an enormous smile. "Invader of Darkness stops you from activating all Quick-play spells! Don't you know anything?"

"Wait. So that means that I'm defenceless?" Yelled Jaden

"Oh, it's worse than that. Next I use Nitro unit on your wingman, and my Invader of darkness attacks him!"

The enormous cloaked warrior charged at Jaden's monster, producing a great sword and slicing the monster in half. As it did this, the nitro unit that had just been equipped to flame wingman began to glow bright red.

"Now, before your life points drop by 800, my bomb detonates. It has the same ability as your wingman, which means that your life points take a hit for a grand total of 2900 damage!"

Jaden's life points stopped on 1100, and Rory ended his turn, playing one card face-down.

"This duel is awesome! If Slifer wasn't going to be barbequed if I lost, I would challenge you to a rematch! But it isn't over yet!" Jaden laughed, drawing a card from his deck "Ok, I use dark factory of mass production, which let's me mass produce two monsters that I have already used. This means that I get back Burstinatrix and Avian."

Rory grinned. He knew that Jaden was about to conduct another fusion, and he could guess what the other card in his hand was. Rory had already won.

"Ok, I use my fusion gate again! This means that I can bring back the elemental hero flame wingman!" Jaden smiled again, pulling one more card from his hand. "Next, I'll destroy my fusion gate to make room for this. It's where my elemental hero monsters can really strut their stuff, Skyscraper! And it means that when my wingman attacks, he gains a whopping 1000 points to help him destroy your invader. And if you remember his super power, that means that you're about to lose."

As Jaden bellowed this, the arena quickly was replaced by an enormous city, with a towering building in the centre. As Flame wingman rose to the top, Jaden gave the order to attack, and the great beast came flying towards Rory.

"Stop right there." Rory cried "I activate Mystical space typhoon. That means that your tower says goodbye, and your wingman is stuck with his 2100 attack points, which means that he cannot take out my monster. And since you ordered him to attack, you are dealt the 800 point difference."

"Ok then," Jaden said, as his life points dropped to 300. "I'm still here. My monster is gone, but I still have kuriboh, and when you destroy him next turn, I don't get done battle damage, so I still have a chance of saving Slifer. I turn Kuriboh to defence position and end my turn."

Rory let out another burst of laughter. "Sure, your Kuriboh protects you from my Invader of darkness, but say I deal damage outside of battle. What happens then?"

He drew a card from his deck. "Perfect. I use this card, Hinotama. This is the end!"

Numerous fireballs erupted from Rory's side of the field, rocketing through the sky and crashing in to Jaden.

"They deal 500 damage to you, and if you had noticed, you only have 300." Rory smirked, turning away as the holograms faded. "Pack your bags. This is your final day at the academy."

"Well, at least it was a sweet duel, I'm glad my last at the academy was that fun!" Jaden laughed.

Rory walked through the crowd, stopping on the other side of the beach, where Damien was already standing, removing the yellow blazer, to reveal his blue one underneath.

"You've done excellent work, Rory." Damien smiled "This day shall forever be remembered as the day that you eliminated Slifer Red dorm. It won't be long before you get promoted to Obelisk. Soon, you shall be recognised for your amazing achievements."

"Thank you, Damien." Laughed Rory "I'm so glad that we will never have to bother with those weaklings again. But, are you sure that they won't try something to get out of it?"

"Oh, they probably will, but that document's fool proof. Only a genius could find the loophole, and only an idiot would use it."

As Damien and Rory walked away, an Obelisk who had been watching the duel had heard their conversation. "Only an idiot, eh? Well, we'll have to see about that." As he said this, he ran up the hill away from the beach, headed for the Chancellor's office. He had seen the plan unfold, and he would not allow Damien's plan to work, and destroy the Slifer Red Dorm forever. He was not a typical Obelisk.


	4. Not an Ordinary Obelisk

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: I apologise for the shortness of this chapter, but I wished to split this chapter in to two parts. _

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Rory was sitting in his room, smiling to himself. Only yesterday, he had managed to win a duel against Jaden Yuki, and secure the destruction of the Slifer dorm. At this very moment, every student who had been placed in Slifer red was being removed from the school.

Rory laughed. He had finally perfected his deck. He did have problems now, as he was in the lowest house in the school, but Damien had promised him that he would soon be an Obelisk.

He could hear the sound of great machines outside of his window, and decided to watch the result of his work. He opened his door, and continued down his corridor. As he proceeded, he noticed that the person with a room next to him, Ted, had left his door open.

This immediately struck Rory as strange, as Ted was a clean freak, and did not like the thought of any airborne bacteria entering his room. Bemused by this concept, Rory gently pushed his hand against the door, giving it just enough force for it to slide open.

Ted was not inside, so Rory assumed that he too had gone to the demolition, though Ted had left a card on the floor. Once more this was strange, as the card was not in a duel sleeve.

Again, because of Ted's fear of disease, he would always place cards in duel sleeves. Rory was begin to become puzzled and infuriated, and thought about leaving the room.

He stood there for a moment, weighing it over in his head, before stepping towards the card on the floor. He lifted it, and to his surprise, the card had been torn down the middle, so that the side with the picture was completely removed. In the place of picture, an image had been sketched on, and Rory instantly recognised it.

The picture was the same one that he had seen on the letter Damien had sent him, of a strange spiked demon. What was strange was that the image had been sketched by hand, in extreme detail, and from the texture of the ink, it seemed that none of the lines had been made outside a minute of each other.

Rory dropped the card on the floor again, dismissing any fears that he may have had. It was just a card that Ted had sprayed with too much disinfectant, and when he ran out of his room, leaving the door open to sterilise his hands, some smart-ass Obelisk must have snuck in and scribbled on the picture. Yes, that must be true.

Rory walked out of the room, leaving the door slightly open so that Ted could get back in, and heading off towards the Northern part of the island, and the Slifer Red dorm.

As Rory arrived, there was an enormous crowd, and the machines were set to destroy the dorm, but were not active. The builders were waiting by their machines, grunting and frowning.

"Hey, what's happening?" Rory asked a nearby Ra Girl.

"Yeah, well this guy called Rory duelled-"

"I know that part, I'm Rory! Why aren't they knocking the dorm down?"

"Oh, well this other thing totally happened, and some Obelisk showed up with some cheesy document from Chancellor Shepherd, saying that he can totally join Slifer Red. Yeah, and he says that unless you duel him as well, he totally gets to keep Slifer."

Rory stared blankly at the girl for a second, before turning away. As he walked to the other side of the crowd, he saw a boy in a blue blazer with brown hair, Damien.

"Damien, what's happening? I tried to ask a person over there and I couldn't understand anything that they said. There was something about an Obelisk?"

"Yes, Richard Capricorn. He apparently has no connections, and did not go to a prep school, making him one of the only people in Obelisk who got in on skill. He saw the duel yesterday, and instantly went to Chancellor Shepherd. He requested that he was placed in Slifer, and the Chancellor let him. That was the loophole, Rory. If we want to get rid of the Slifers, you have to duel him as well."

Rory smiled. "A Slifer is a Slifer. Let's do this."

He walked towards the main body of the crowd, ramming in to people to push his way through, where a boy slightly taller than him, with long dark hair was standing. He was still wearing his Obelisk uniform, but Rory knew who he was.

Rory climbed over the workmen's barrier, and approached the boy. "Richard Capricorn?" he said, less of a question and more of a statement.

"Yes, and you're Rory Lionheart. I assume that you're here to duel me."

Rory nodded, and as he did so, Richard beckoned, and two Slifers ran over carrying something. One of them removed Richard's Obelisk uniform, whilst the other attached a Slifer Red Jacket to him.

"I thought that I might try to look the part." Joked Richard, though Rory did not smile. "Fine then, deadly serious. I'll go first."

A couple of minutes later, each duellist had taken up their position on the duelling field. Rory was standing on a rock, and a few metres away, Richard was still making light of the situation by sitting in the shovel end of one of the machines, raised roughly two feet from the ground.

"If you're going to completely make fun of me at least make your move, Slifer." Rory frowned

"Ah, but I was an Obelisk," Richard says "but anyway, I'll play one monster card in face-down defence position and activate my pot of greed."

"How exactly did you get in to Obelisk?" Rory asked, adopting a mocking tone. "It certainly wasn't with your duelling skills."

"Well, we'll see. Anyway, my pot of greed lets me draw two new cards." Richard said, lifting two cards from his deck. "And now I'll end my turn."

"Somehow, I'm still not getting the amazing duellist thing."

"Oh, you will. Just wait." Richard replied, lying back in the shovel of the crane.

"Fine. Draw. I will summon my White ninja in attack position!" Rory roared, as a small white ninja appeared beside him. "Now attack his face-down monster."

A set of shuriken flew at the face-down card, and a small rock object appeared, disappearing under the wave of attacks.

"I'm sorry, but that's no victory for you. You only destroyed my charm of shabti. And at no life point loss to me. I thought you were going to summon a second monster and attack me."

"Well how would I do that?" Rory replied stunned at how well Richard was taking this.

"I don't know. That's part of the surprise. Use your head, Ror. Can I call you Ror?"

"No you cannot call me 'Ror', nor can you call me anything else." Rory shouted "Now I set one card face down and end my turn."

"Good choice, I like a bit of mystery, it adds to the fun of the duel!"

Richard drew a card. "Ah my greatest monster." He smiled, staring at the card. "I special summon my Megarock dragon in attack position by removing from play charm of Shabti in my graveyard. You see, my monster has attack points equal to 700 X the number of rock-type monsters that I remove from play when I summon him."

"So he has 700 attack. THAT is your best monster?" Rory gasped

"Oh no, not yet. It will be though. I just put him there so that I could do this."

As Richard lifted a card from his hand, his Megarock dragon evaporated, and was quickly replace by a large beetle, with a glowing probe for a horn.

"You see, since my Megarock dragon was a special summon, I still have my normal summon, which I used to tribute summon my sabre beetle. Am I going too fast for you?"

"No, too slow actually." Rory snapped

"Good. Then you won't mind me taking the lead in this duel, and destroying your white ninja."

As he said this, the enormous insect leapt forward, slicing the ninja in half with its probe.

"Better still, since your monster only has 1500 attack points, and mine has 2400, I deal an extra 900 damage to your life points. 3100 away from Slifer's freedom."

"Are you done yet?" Rory asked in an angry voice.

"Not quite, first I'll activate another pot of greed."

"What is up with the pots of greed?" Rory asked his voice going louder and louder with anger.

"I don't know, I guess that I just felt that since I'm not in Obelisk anymore, I shouldn't put amazing cards in my deck, only okay ones."

"Wait a minute, you're duelling me with a deck of okay cards?" Rory yelled, his eyes nearly bursting from his head.

"Oh, why, is there something wrong with that? Did you want to loose on the second turn. I could have made it happen."

Rory gulped. He drew a card, and the frown on his face suddenly slipped in to a smile.

"Do you think that you're so amazing? Well you'll fall now. It seems that my quest to destroy Slifer will end in a recurring victory. I activate my level conversion lab. You know the rules by now, so I'll just roll the dice."

Rory tossed the dice out in to the grass, and it bounced a few times, before stopping in amongst some tall grass. Richard leant in to the compartment of the crane and flicked the switch for the crane to move forwards. It stopped just behind his Sabre beetle, and he jumped off to look for the dice. After a moment of intent searching, he discovered it, smiling.

"It's a 1, that means that you're monster is destroyed!" Richard said, letting out a burst of laughter. After a moment, he stopped laughing. "It's actually a 4."

He tossed the dice to Rory, and took up his seat on the shovel end of the crane once more.

"So Ror, what monster are you going to summon?" Richard asked

"My name isn't Ror, and I will summon my level 4 Invader of Darkness in attack position. With 2900 attack points, he easily crushes your Sabre beetle. Now, Invader of Darkness, crush his sabre beetle.

The enormous cloaked warrior leapt forwards, as Rory emitted a burst of maniacal laughter. In less than a second, the enormous creature had sliced Richard's beetle in half. Richard's life points fell to 3500, but he didn't even blink.

"So, that makes it only 3500 points until Slifer's destruction!" Rory sniggered

"I'm still winning. I have more life points." Richard grinned. "And I prepared for that oversized joke."

"Yes, well it doesn't matter." Rory interrupted "I have more cards, more powerful cards, and in a couple of turns you shall be defeated. And I have done this all without any knowledge of your deck!"

As Rory once more began to let out a burst of laughter, Richard closed his eyes and smiled, blocking out his opponent's voice. He knew what was coming. And he knew that he was going to win. He had seen pro league duellists follow similar strategies as Rory, and they could easily have been beaten by what Richard was planning.

He looked at the cards in his hand. He had buster rancher, so all he needed was a monster, and he would have 3500 attack points to throw around. But what he really planned to use to win this match lied inside his graveyard. But by proceeding with his plan, he would make something in Rory's graveyard just as dangerous.

If he planned to win this duel, he would have to put everything in to it that he could. It would be the only way to save Slifer Red.


	5. What lies in the grave

_LAST TIME…_

_In an attempt to destroy Slifer Red, Damien convinced Rory to duel with Jaden. After defeating him, an Obelisk, Richard Capricorn, converted to Slifer Red, meaning that Rory would have to duel him to secure the elimination of Slifer Red. Rory was quickly forced backwards by Richard's Sabre beetle, though by chance he was able to summon Invader of Darkness. Who shall win this fight to save or destroy Slifer Red?_

Rory stopped laughing. "So, are you going to make your move or just sit there, with your eyes closed?" He chuckled "I almost forgot, it's still my turn. Well I'm done, so you can begin. But if I even hear the words 'pot of greed', then I shall personally ensure that when Slifer is sent packing, you are too."

Richard opened his eyes, a wide smile thick on his tanned face. "When? You assume that you will win. If you are so sure of yourself, how about a wager. If you win, I leave the school. But If I win, then you have to run ten laps around the island."

"Fine. If you think it will make you feel better."

Richard put his hand on his deck, pulling off the top card and not looking at it. His smile grew wider. "I summon my monster in attack position!" he put the card down on the field, and a zombified creature appeared in front of him.

"Well, look at that, it's my poison mummy." Richard said, grinning.

"Are you insane?" Rory laughed "Because if you had set that card, you'd be done no damage when I attack, and you could also deal 500 to me with its effect. You see, in duelling, you need to play monsters with more attack. Yours only has 1000."

"Exactly 1000." Richard said, pulling another card from his hand. "Which means that he can still be equipped with buster rancher!"

As Richard placed the card on the field, an enormous gun appeared in the hand of the mummy, pointing in to the sky, its barrel above the top of the cranes.

"You see, only a monster with 1000 or less attack points can use buster rancher, but if you have a monster with over 2500 attack, then my mummy's attack skyrockets to 3500!"

"3500 attack points!" Rory screamed "But that can-"

"Waste your invader." Richard smiled as he interrupted, pointing forward, signalling the attack "Black Buster bullet, now!"

The Mummy leapt in to the air, high above the dorm roof, aiming the gun downwards. A spiralling white blast splattered from the end of the weapon, completely encompassing Rory and his monster. When the mummy landed and the blast cleared, the invader of darkness was gone, and Rory's life points had dropped to 2500.

"Oh dear. It appears that you did not lose all of your life points, just your cards. Then I guess that I'll play these 3 cards face down." Richard mocked "And I'll use a spell card. That's right, it's pot of greed! I draw two cards, and I'll play them both face-down. Your turn, Ror."

"I told you not to call me that, and I told you not to use another one of those cards. Well, at least I have logic on my side. You can't use any more spell or trap cards, because your spaces are full."

"It doesn't matter. I don't plan on using any more spell or trap cards."

"Oh really. Perhaps another bet." Rory proposed, raising an eyebrow. "If you can only use those 5 cards, and no other spell or traps, and then you win, I will run an additional ten laps around the island."

"Fine." Richard said simply. This was going to be better than he had hoped.

"Well that little mummy will be no more use to you, because I'm using fissure." Rory smirked, as an abyss opened in the earth, dropping the mummy and its gun in to a fiery river of lava. "It takes your monster with the lowest attack and destroys it."

"Not so fast!" Richard interrupted "I activate a trap card. Actually, I activate three."

As he said this, his three central trap cards spun up. Each of them was identical, and showed a boulder being smashed against a castle rampart.

"Meet my rock bombardments. Each time, I pick 1 rock-type monster in my deck, throw it to the graveyard, and deal 500 damage to you."

"So what, I have 2500. That leaves me with 1000 left, genius." Rory mocked

"Nevertheless, I send destroyer golem, guardian statue and golem sentry to the graveyard." As Richard said this, a catapult appeared, launching three enormous boulders at Rory, and his life points dropped to 1000.

"I'm still here. Your little boulders didn't even scrape me. And if I can resume what I was doing, I remove from play white ninja and invader of darkness in my graveyard, to summon the almighty Chaos Emperor Dragon – Envoy Of The End!"

The whole battlefield shook, and the ground began to tremble. A great purple cloud appeared in the sky. As great bolt of lightning appeared in the sky, crackling downwards, Richard once more interrupted.

"I have a fourth trap card!" he smiled "The transmigration prophecy. It allows me to select 2 cards in either of our graveyards, and return them to our decks. Now I could stop your summon, but I don't need to. Instead I'll send two of my own cards back to my deck."

"Then my summoning continues. Chaos Emperor Dragon, arise!" Rory shrieked in to the darkness. As he did so, the great blue shimmering dragon that he has used against Damien slowly hovered downwards from the sky, roaring. "And since you have no monsters, my emperor attacks you directly, lowering your life points to 500."

Rory was correct. Richard's life points dropped dramatically, ending at 500. If he wanted to win now, he was going to need the card that he had returned from his graveyard. It was his only hope.

"Well, I'll end my turn, leaving you with this thought. In only a couple of turns, this duel shall end. It shall end in my favour, and you see all of those people in red? They will have to leave this school. And that isn't my fault. It's yours. You could have stopped me from summoning my emperor dragon, but you didn't. When they leave this island, it will be on your chest."

Richard looked around. Because of Rory's comments, the Slifers amongst the crowd were beginning to frown, and give angry looks to Richard. He could see what Rory was doing, and Richard knew it wasn't about being dramatic. It was about making them hate him.

"I'm terribly sorry that you've done this, but it is in your hands now." He finished, shaking his head disapprovingly.

"No, Rory, I'm sorry." Richard yelled, his face covered with rage "I am sorry that you and your Obelisk friends think that you can push us around. I'm sorry, that you have failed to consider what I could be ready to do. But what I'm most sorry about, is that you think that you can just manipulate anyone you want. I will not stand for that. And you're right. This match will end in a couple of turns, and when it does, you'll be wearing jogging shoes!"

Rory smiled and let out a sigh. "They do not listen to your words, and quite rightly-"

Half way through his speech, Rory was cut out, as a boy in the crowd yelled out.

"I think you're right!" said the brown hair boy, Jaden, emerging from the crowd "He can't push us around because he's in a higher dorm than us. It doesn't matter what cards he has now, he will win, and we won't put him down, because us Slifers stand together!"

At this, cries of agreement burst out throughout the crowd. Richard turned to Jaden, mouthing a thank you before turning to continue you duel, drawing a card.

"Ok, as I say, in a couple of turns I'll win, so for now I'll just set a monster in defence mode and end my turn."

"What's that? Slifer for 'I have no good cards'?" Rory joked. There was no response to this joke, other than a few giggles from Obelisks, and an uproar of boos from the Slifers. "Fine then, I'll draw a card, and destroy your face down."

As the chaos Emperor dragon blasted out an enormous stream of white energy, Richards face down flipped up. It was a small stone warrior. The dragon's blast crushed the creature in to dust.

"I end my turn. So I expect you to 'wow' me. You said that this was when you would win." Rory mocked.

"Fine, I was hoping to drag it on for a few more turns, make a few more wagers, and end up with you doing 100 laps, but I can end it now."

Richard drew a card from his deck. "Ah, my greatest monster has returned." He smiled "Ror, do you remember my Mega rock dragon? Well, I told you he would get better, and here he comes! I special summon him by removing from play my destroyer golem, Golem sentry, Guardian statue, and Lost guardian, to give me a total of 2800 attack points!"

Rocks flew from the ground, crushing together to create an enormous dragon, with jagged spikes of stone emerging from its sides, and a tail that wrapped around the crane Richard was sitting on.

"Hello, haven't you noticed?" Rory teased "My dragon has 3000 points. You're 200 short. It was a nice try, but not good enough."

"That's why I have my fifth trap!" Richard laughed as Rory's face was hit by a frown "Return from the different dimension! I pay half my life points, and get to resummon any of my removed from play monsters on my side of the field. That means we can say a warm re-welcome to destroyer golem, Golem sentry, guardian statue, and charm of Shabti!"

"Is that all, because my monster still has more attack than any of those."

"No Ror, It's not all, because my monsters may not have enough attack apart, but when they team up they are strong, or should I say, when they Unite, they stand!"

Rory's eyes went right open, in a look of true fear "You don't mean?"

"That's right, I use United we stand on my Megarock Dragon. He gains 800 attack points for every monster on my field, other than himself. That gives him 6000 attack points!"

"6000! You're monsters get stronger and stronger. I can't believe it!" Rory gasped

"Do believe it! Now my Megarock dragon, Boulder Barrage! Destroy his dragon!"

Numerous Pieces of earth flew in to the air, smashing in to Rory's chaos emperor dragon. After a matter of seconds, the creature burst in to shards, ricocheting in to the graveyard.

"Fine then. It's not something that I can't recover from!" Rory said staggering backwards.

"Eh, eh, eh! Silly Ror. You forget, my monster has 6000 attack points. Yours had 3000. You have 1000 life points. That means goodbye Ror!"

Rory flinched. He looked at his life point gauge in disbelief, before collapsing to the ground. An enormous round of cheering burst from every Slifer in the crowd, covering the whole of the area in the sound of victory. Richard hit one of the gear sticks in the crane compartment, sending the shovel up in to the air, where he bowed numerous times for his adoring fans.

As Richard celebrated his victory, Rory began to walk away. Seeing this, Richard clambered down, and ran up behind him.

"Hey Rory!" he yelled, holding out his hand

"Oh yes, pleasantries." Rory grunted, shaking hands with his opponent

"Great duel!" Richard said, though Rory stood back, as the compliment was unexpected, and he was not prepared to return the favour. "You're a good duellist, but you can't beat me."

"That's because you're an Obelisk."

"Nah, I'm no ordinary Obelisk. In fact, I'm not an Obelisk, I'm a Slifer now!"

Rory began to walk away.

"Hey, where are you going?" Richard asked "Stay around for a while!"

"No, I have a lot of running to do."

At that, Rory walked away, leaving Richard with his fellow Slifers. Rory approached Damien, who had gone to the edge of the Slifer Dorms, and was staring at the ocean.

"Damien, I failed." Rory said, looked down at his shoes.

"Oh no. You succeeded." Damien smiled "Everything went as I had planned. You see, our group of Obelisks had not gone unnoticed. You see Chancellor shepherd knew that we were planning something, but didn't know what. I needed a scapegoat, and this whole, destroy Slifer thing worked perfectly. I shall still require your assistance in the future, Rory."

Rory smiled. He returned to his dorm feeling slightly better, though the crushing defeat was still preying on his mind. As he arrived at his dorm, he found a crowd of people gathered there too.

Rory ran forward, to see a police barrier blocking the door, and numerous guards blocking the students. He turned to Bastion Misawa, another Ra from down the corridor.

"Bastion, What's happened?" he queried "Why can't we go in to our dorm?"

"Apparently, a student's gone missing. They're investigating his room."

"Who was it?"

"I think it was that clean freak, Ted."

Rory stepped backwards. He had remembered this morning. When he had entered Ted's room to find No-one there, and that strange symbol. Ted must have been kidnapped by one of Damien's Obelisks. But Why?

As Rory thought about this, three guards left the building, two of them carrying a large stretcher together, with what appeared to be a student on it. As the other guards held back the students staring at Ted's blood-drained face, the third guard walked forwards with a mega speaker.

"Students of the Ra yellow dorm. Students of Duel academy. This school has been deemed unsafe. Something has attempted to kill a boy, and we have not been able to find out whom. We will be questioning you all for what you may have seen, and suggesting that you close all windows and lock all doors at night. Until the perpetrator is found, this school is dangerous. We urge you, if you have seen anything that will aid the investigation, then please come out. You may return to your dorm rooms."

Ten minutes later, the Ra yellow students were gathered in their cafeteria, all talking about what they had just seen.

"So, Rory, did you notice what the Guard spokeswomen said. She said something has attacked a student. What do you think that means?" Bastion asked

"I assume that she just has poor grammar. Why, what do you think she meant?"

"I don't know, but you must have seen something. You're room is right next to Ted's."

"No, I didn't see anything!" Rory snapped "I left early to see the Slifer destruction!"

At this, Rory walked out of the room, slamming his food tray down in a washing up pile.

Later that night, he was sitting on his bed, after double-checking that his window and door were sealed and locked. He thought about what he had seen earlier, and what it had resulted in. Even though he had been at the back of the crowd, Rory could still see Ted. He was pale, and had had all of his blood pumped out. _Sucked_ out. The thought of it made Rory cringe. And Bastion was right, the spokeswomen has said something. That either meant an animal, or someone who had done something animal-like. Bastion was also right, Rory did know something. He knew what the symbol that had been left in Ted's room meant. In the morning, he would find Damien.

But for now, that creature was still out there. And Rory could feel it in his bones. He knew deep down, that that creature would strike again. And this time the victim might not be so lucky as to escape like Ted had. Next time, there might be a death at the academy. And if there was a death, it might mean that the school would be closed. Worse still, the next death might not happen one door away, Rory could be next…


	6. Wolves in the woods

_AUTHORS NOTE- Sorry, this chapter is quite long. I just needed to get alot of stuff done now, because there won't be many more chances._

Rory sat up in bed and immediately knew something was wrong. Whether it was the darkness outside the window or the noise seeping in to his room from the corridor, he knew that something was amiss.

There were two voices outside, in deep conversation, though Rory could not hear them, without opening the door and revealing himself. He also noticed that the strange darkness outside the window meant it was night time, and confirmed this with a glance at his alarm clock. It was 11.45 pm.

Rory could not hear the voices outside, but he could tell that one of them was angry. Very angry. The other was whimpering, though they had a gruff voice, and seemed almost animal-like. After a few minutes more of the aggravated conversation, Rory heard a cracking sound coming from down the hall, like splintering wood. The voices had moved down there as well, now, so Rory slipped out of bed and crept to the door.

He placed his hand on the door knob, not knowing whether to turn it or not, as he could well be putting himself at risk doing so. Suddenly, he remembered how pale and blood-drained Ted had looked, and his hand snapped backwards from the door.

Almost as soon as he had done this, another crash happened on the other side of the corridor, back where the voices had been, though the people who owned them had long stopped talking.

There was another crash. Again and again! Suddenly, the lights in the corridor turned on and Rory heard a scream. He recognised the voice instantly, and it was that of Professor Satyr, the head of Ra Yellow.

Rory could hear numerous doors opening, coupled with a scream from the opposite side of the corridor from the Professor. It was coming from the side where the crashing had happened.

Rory once more pictured Ted in his head, and lunged at his door, tearing it open and sticking his head outwards. First of all he saw other Ras who had opened their doors to see what was happening. Then, on his left, he saw Professor Satyr lying on the floor in terror.

It was only after looking at these things that Rory turned his gaze to the right, and saw the horrifying sight that was there. A student's door had been smashed open, and a massive creature was dragging the student from it.

The beast was standing on two legs, and was covered from head to toe in thick grey fur. Wrapped around its legs was a tattered loincloth, splattered with dirt.

It clasped one of its enormous, stone-like claws around the boy, who was still screaming with fear, and pulled its head from the room, turning towards the students and Professor, brandishing its rows of shining silver teeth, and letting out a horrendous roar. It blinked its two florescent, yellow eyes twice, before crashing on to all fours and charging down the corridor.

The students slammed their doors as it approached, opening them moments later when it had passed. Each of them stared as hard as they could, but by the time they had opened their doors again, the creature had left, and Professor Satyr was also nowhere to be seen.

The only clues that the monster had ever been there were the destroyed door at the end of the corridor, and the hole in the wall that it had made upon leaving.

Rory closed his door, his face paler than usual, as he thought about the horror that he had witnessed. He now knew what had taken Ted, and he knew that he had to stop it.

The beast's scream had cracked the glass in the windows, but Rory crawled back in to bed anyway, as he knew that if the creature wanted to get in it could anyway, and he doubted it would return that night.

Rory woke again, though this time there was a soft beam of light sifting in through the blinds. He turned over, to face his alarm clock, and realised that he only had a few minutes before class. He leapt from his bed and got dressed quickly, running down the corridor and heading for the stairs. Then he stopped half way along the corridor, seeing the debris from the night before, and remembering the enormous creature that had been standing right where he was now.

Rory shrugged it off and ran to his classroom, though when he arrived he was one of the first Ras there. He sat down in his seat, and asked Bastion what was happening.

"Well, you see." He began "After last night, lots of the students are asking to go home, and their parents are picking them up. Personally, I don't see the point, as the creature is unlikely to pick Ra yellow for a third time in the row, especially since all of these people are leaving."

"The why aren't the Slifers or Obelisks going anywhere?" Rory asked, as he had just realised that there were no Obelisks or Slifers missing.

"Oh that's quite simple. The Obelisks think it's a hoax, and the Slifers think that Richard will protect them."

"Okay." Rory muttered, turning back to the front of the class.

Only a few moments later, Chancellor Shepherd came to the front of the room. "I'm sorry to say that two people have gone missing, one of whom is Professor Satyr, and as such, the school has been deemed unsafe, and shall close at the end of the month."

This comment caused uproar amongst nearly every student who was sat there. They were yelling comments such as 'unfair' and 'why do we have to leave just because of some hoax?' The scene was one of absolute chaos.

A couple of hours later, after the students had been calmed down, Rory was walking along one of the corridors, when he saw Damien, staring out of the window at the ocean below.

"Damien!" Rory yelled running up to him.

Damien turned around to face Rory. "Bad news, huh?" he said in a blank tone

Rory did not answer; instead, he went almost silent, so that no-one would be able to overhear him. "Damien, your symbol was found in Ted's room at the time that he disappeared. Do you know anything about this creature?"

Damien raised an eyebrow, and also replied almost silently "I know nothing about the creature, and assume that one of the Obelisks was just tagging the area."

After saying this, Damien began to walk away down the corridor. Rory also began to move, running up next to Damien. "I can tell that it wasn't a tag, whoever sent that creature out left it there, which means that it was one of your friends!"

"My friends would not do this, and what makes you think that someone released it anyway?"

"I heard voices in the corridor. Someone was talking to the beast, and they were angry with it. I know that whoever they were, they were his master."

Damien muttered a single word under his breath, before realising that Rory was still there, saying "Goodbye" and running off down the corridor. Rory tried to catch up with him, but by the time he had turned the corner, Damien was gone, and Rory could hear his footsteps on the stairs. He wouldn't be able to catch him up.

Richard kicked the can again. How could they do this to him? He had no family. They had been killed when he was young, and now, after having to fend for himself and get in to this school, he would have to leave.

He had planned to use this as a start off point to get in to the Pro League, and be able to live normally, but now he would have to go back to living in a run-down orphanage. He could apply to North academy in Autumn, but that meant nearly a year of eating only bread and butter, and sleeping on a straw mattress. Even the food in Slifer was better than what he had been getting.

As he kicked the can for a fifth time, Professor Crowler ran up to him.

"Richard!" he said, clearly trying to sound as feminine as possible "Though I regret your choice to become a slacker, Chancellor Shepherd requests you in his office immediately."

Richard and Crowler had walked straight to the office, and when Richard arrived, he found that Jaden Yuki was already there.

"Boys." The chancellor said "Contrary to what we told the guards, we do have a lead. Recently, a small group of second year Obelisks got together, and started secretly testing Ras. Their leader, Damien Cavourre, recruited a Ra yellow student, Rory Lionheart, at the beginning of this year."

"Rory?" Richard gasped

"Yes. When you duelled him for the demolition of Slifer dorm, we suspected that that was the group's plan, though it seems it was just a decoy. We found at the scene of Ted's disappearance, a small card with a symbol on it. We found it as graffiti on some Obelisk arenas, and also found Rory's fingerprints on it. We believe that he unleashed that monster under Damien's command."

"Ok, but what does that have to do with us?" Jaden asked

"There are four leaders in the group, called the emissaries. I want you both to hunt them all down, and duel them, so that we can find out about the cult's involvement. But you must duel all four within ten days, because as you know, the school must close at the end of the month. Are you up to the task?"

"You bet we are! It's time for us to get our games on!" Jaden yelled, as the pair walked towards the door.

"By the way, Chancellor Shepherd, why did you agree to the demolition of Slifer dorm?" Richard asked "Was it a plan to find out what the Obelisks were up to?"

"No, I just thought it would be fun to watch." Laughed Chancellor shepherd

At this the two young duellists' jaws dropped in surprise, as they were so amazed by what the Chancellor had just said. They stumbled out of the doorway, thinking about the task ahead of them, and how they planned to find and defeat these four emissaries.

Damien was sitting in his room, frowning. Bone had betrayed him. He had been foolish enough to get overheard. Now Damien had to deal with not only Chancellor Shepherd, who had undoubtedly traced the clues Bone had left back to him, but also about Rory, who was evermore likely to leave his side as time went on. He needed to find a lot of duelling energy fast, so he would need to find the perfect opponent. He had ten days to act out his plan in, and needed to finish preparations before the end of the weekend, or it would mean that everything that he had worked so hard to create over the past two years would be gone. He needed to activate plan 'Route to Dread' as soon as possible.

He stood up, and turned to a wall, covered by a large poster of the king of games and a Dark magician, and peeled up the bottom of the poster.

Underneath there was a small bank vault, roughly three feet in diameter. Damien punched in a combination, and the door slid open. But instead of taking something out, he clambered in and crawled in to the back, where there was a large room.

At the back of the room was an enormous swirling purple vortex, lighting the entire room.

"My master, the plan shall proceed immediately." Damien said, talking directly in to the glowing vortex.

A great roar emerged from it in response, which Damien understood, through working with the thing that had made the roar on countless occasions.

"Though Bone has betrayed us, I shall be able to complete your summoning within the week."

The creature let out another tremendous roar.

"Yes my master." Said Damien, turning and leaving the vault.

That night, Richard was lying face down in a bush, only twenty feet from the Ra dorm. He was wearing Green camouflage clothing, and had a pair of black binoculars around his neck. He had been camped out since sundown, and it was coming up for midnight.

He yawned silently, keeping quiet so that when the creature showed up, he would not be attacked instantly. Richard had asked Jaden if he wanted to come, considering they had both been asked to do it, but Jaden said that he would not be able to stay awake long enough. Thus, Richard was here alone.

Richard was starting to think that the beast wasn't going to show up, and thought about heading back, when he heard a rustling of bushes only a few metres to his left. He pressed his chest to the ground, and slivered through the undergrowth towards the sound.

As he drew nearer, he became certain that there was someone crouched there. He rose to his feet, removing a net from his bag and throwing it in to the bushes.

"What are you doing?" came a familiar voice from the bushes.

"Ror?" asked Richard, raising an eyebrow at the black-haired boy inside the net "What are you doing out here? Summoning beasts perhaps?"

"What are you talking about? I'm out here looking for the monster! I'm not bringing it out!"

"Then please explain your fingerprints in Ted's room on something left after the attack."

"What? My fingerprints couldn't possibly have been in his room, I left early to see Slifer destroyed! Now take me out of this net!"

"You didn't leave early to see Slifer demolished, because you were late arriving to the duel against me. Now I will take off the net, but only because I will need it to catch the monster."

As soon as Richard had removed the net, Rory leapt to his feet, dusting himself off.

"Since you're here," said Rory, with anger in his voice "I might as well tell you my lead."

"Oh please do." Richard replied

"The creature that attacked the dorm has grey fur and a loincloth. Recently, a new duel monsters card was released by the name of Lycanthrope. It's a ritual monster, and it is the same as the creature that we keep seeing."

"How right you are my boys!" said a man with an American accent from behind them.

Richard and Rory turned, to see a man in dark robes accompanied by the enormous creature that was attacking the dorms.

"My name is Bone." Continued the man "My friend here is Wolf. He's the first emissary of darkness. I'm the second, so if you want to duel me, you'll have to get through him. Familiar with Shadow games?"

"Oh yes, we feel the pain every time you attack!" frowned Rory "I don't think so."

"Then maybe you're friend would feel so inclined to duel Wolf here."

"Ok then, what have I got to lose?" Richard replied, producing a duel disk. "Are you staying to translate?"

"Oh, no. I'll be leaving now. I just came so that while Wolf takes you on, I can go snatch myself some more Ras for the boss' tests. Goodbye y'all."

Suddenly, the black cloaked figure vanished, leaving Rory and Richard with the hulking, ten-foot tall creature.

The creature let out a thunderous roar. It quickly followed by saying "Get ready to duel." In a gruff voice, the same one that Rory had heard the night before.

"You can talk?" screamed both boys in unison

"Indeed. My master gave me life, and with it the ability to speak. He shall gain sovereign power over this world, and give all duel spirits the freedom that he has given Bone and I. Now without much further ado, prepare for your final battle!"

At this, Wolf roared again, and an enormous silver panel emerged from his arm. On it there were markings, and there was a deck strapped to it.

"I'll go first!" Howled Wolf, drawing six cards. "I summon Silver fang and use the field spell card Forest!"

As Wolf said this, and played two cards, the entire area around Ra Dorm turned forested, and a small Silver wolf appeared.

"Because of my spell card, my monster gains 200 attack points, taking him up to 1400!"

"Fine. My turn." Said Richard, drawing a card. "I summon destroyer golem with 1500 attack points. Now I attack your little wolf"

The Stone golem leapt forward, pounding one of its iron fists in to the wolf, shattering it. As it did this, Wolf's life points slipped down to 3900.

"He he he. Perfect." Giggled Wolf "I'll just use Graceful charity. This means that I draw three cards, then discard two of them."

The enormous creature pulled three cards from its deck, slapping two of them in to his graveyard.

"Now, because I have two Mother grizzlies in my graveyard, I can remove one from play to summon Fenrir, and remove the other for a second copy of Fenrir."

As Wolf said this, two enormous grey wolves appeared alongside him.

"And since they are beats, they each now have 1600 attack. That means that my first destroys your golem, and my second attacks you directly."

The First wolf leapt forwards, smashing the golem. Richard felt a slight itch as he lost his first hundred life points, though when the second wolf leapt at him, he collapsed in agony as its claws dug in to his flesh.

"Ah. My turn." Panted Richard, as his life points dropped to 2300. The blood was beginning to trickle from his arm. "Draw!"

"Stop there!" Roared Wolf "I'm afraid that you do not draw this turn, because my Fenrir destroyed you're monster as a result of battle. So any card that you were planning to draw and win with, is now not coming. Also, if you want to draw next turn, then you will have to play no monsters. If you play no monsters, then I shall win next turn."

The enormous beast let out a deep roar, and by this point, many lights had turned on in the Ra dorm, as students investigated the noise. Richard placed his hand on his arm, cursing under his breath, as he looked at his hand.

"Fine. I remove from play my destroyer golem to special summon Mega Rock dragon, and tribute him to summon my Judge man!"

A tall man appeared alongside Richard wielding a club.

"It has 2200 attack points, so it will make short work of your Fenrir, but first I use double attack. By discarding Gaia the fierce knight from my hand, my judge man can attack twice this turn. So it will attack both your Fenrirs."

The man leapt forwards, smashing the first wolf with his club. No sooner had Wolf's life points hit 3300, the Judge man struck again, crushing the other one. As the thug took up his position alongside Richard again, Wolf's life points dropped to 2700.

"I'll place one card face down and end my turn." Smiled Richard, whose arm was still seeping a thin layer of blood.

"Now is the end!" Roared Wolf, drawing his card. "I use advanced Ritual art! By taking two more Silver Fangs in my deck and tossing them in to the graveyard, I can ritual summon my Lycanthrope!"

Wolf's deck glowed. Suddenly, an enormous werewolf appeared, that was identical to Wolf.

"Next I'll use fissure." The beast howled "That destroys your judge man, and seals your fate. I cannot wait to devour you!"

A hole opened in the floor and the Judge man toppled in to it, leaving only the Lycanthrope on the field.

"Because of my field bonus, my Lycanthrope has 2600 attack points, which is enough to finish you!"

The enormous wolf bounded forwards, and drew back its claw, but before it could strike, a glowing aura appeared around Richard.

"I activate my face-down card, negate attack!" Richard said, through painful breaths, still clutching his left arm.

"Fine then." Howled Wolf "Next turn I shall rip you asunder."

"There won't be a next turn!" Richard shouted with new life. "I summon charm of Shabti in attack position!"

"In attack position?" yelled Rory, who had remained rather quiet until now. "It only has 100 attack points!"

"That's why you lost Rory, you always think that there's only one way to win. There isn't" Richard smiled "I activate creature swap!"

"What?" roared wolf, shattering many of the Ra windows, and letting the tree branches that had come with the field spell card fall inwards. "You can't!"

"Sorry, but I have." Grinned Richard "It allows me to swap our two monsters. So you get my attack position charm of Shabti, and I get your juiced up 2600 attack point Lycanthrope!"

The small stone idol disappeared, reappearing in front of Wolf, and the enormous grey Werewolf reappeared on Richard's side.

"Now, my Lycanthrope attacks!" Richard smiled.

The beast bounded forwards again, only this time towards its original master. It crushed the charm in mid stride, mashing in to Wolf before running back to Richard, who petted it gently on the head.

"Fine. I live. I only have 200 life points, but my dark hole will re-even the balance on my turn." Wolf howled, now covered in blood.

"Sorry. But you should recap on your own cards. When Lycanthrope deals battle damage to you, you get dealt an additional 200 for every normal monster in my graveyard. For example my Judge man."

The Lycanthrope's eyes glowed bright yellow, as it charged forwards again, landing on Wolf and sinking its teeth in to him. With this final attack, his life points hit zero.

The holograms disappeared, and Richard stepped over, quickly followed by Rory. He looked down at the blood-stained Wolf in front of him.

"Who summoned you?" Richard said, with a lighter tone, now that the fight was over.

"The dark spirits in the shadow realm. A human from this Earth made contact with the most feared of them all, and summoned me. He recruited me and got me to attack those students. He needed them for an experiment. To summon the dark one. Cavourre. He is the one you seek, the fourth emissary. In less than a week he shall summon the dark demon." Howled Wolf, as blood pumped from him.

"Ok, we can get you to a hospital, then you can tell us more." Richard smiled, stroking Wolf's fur.

"No. It is my time. I was born of the forest, and I just wish to see it again. Alas, my life has been made outside my home now, so take me to be healed."

As Rory and Richard each grabbed one of Wolf's arms, a surge of energy flew out of the sky. It crashed in to Wolf, causing many new wounds to form. Rory and Richard looked up.

"Sorry, my boys. Couldn't allow you to be taking away my Wolf now could I? He has too much valuable information in that head of his." Said Bone, standing on the dorm roof and holding a buster rancher.

"You fiend!" Yelled Richard "He was wounded and you attacked him! You're just scum! Come down here and fight me fair!"

"Maybe another time." Grinned Bone "I'm needed by the boss."

Once more, Bone vanished in to thin air. Richard had his fists clenched in rage, ignoring his own pain. Rory walked up behind him, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Richard, we could still be able to save him. You need to get to the hospital ward as well, so I'll tell Chancellor Shepherd about the leads we got here."

Richard turned and smiled "Thank you Rory. It takes a lot to tell the Chancellor who was planning this, especially when it's your friend."

"Damien isn't my friend." Frowned Rory "Now let's get Wolf back to the academy."

Once more, Richard and Rory ran up to wolf and began to take him to the gates. As they started pulling him away, students started running from the Ra dorm, and latched on to parts of Wolf, helping to lift him, until at least twenty people were pulling him along.

Damien was sitting in the vault, his eyes closed. The vortex in front of him was showing the events at the dorm.

"It seems that we will have to advance the stages of the plan. Bone, hold off Rory at all costs. Spirit, round up some more test subjects. We have 24 hours to initiate plan 'Route to Dread'!" Damien roared at the two men standing behind him. As they left, he turned back to the vortex.

"Master, though they resist, you shall once more feel the wind upon you. You shall be free in 23 hours and 59 minutes."


	7. Life through Death

Chapter 7

Rory frowned. He was sitting on a velvet sofa, outside the chancellor's office.

He looked down at his watch, for the seventh time that minute. It was almost 4 in the morning. He had now been waiting for about an hour, but what he needed couldn't last until morning.

He had to tell the Chancellor about Damien. He had to recount the events of the night, of how Wolf had challenged Richard to a shadow game, how Bone had arrived and attacked him, and about the horrific creature that would soon be unleashed upon the world.

When he had arrived, an assistant had told him that he would have to wait until morning, because the Chancellor was asleep, but when he urged her about how important this was, she had eventually complied, and gone to awake the Chancellor.

That had been three quarters of an hour ago, and he had had no reply since. He glanced down again at his watch. As he did this, the doors in front of him opened, to reveal dim lights on inside.

He stood up, brushing the layer of dust off of him. He gave out one yawn and stepped forward.

"Rory, you can come in now." Muttered the assistant from somewhere inside, though the lighting was too dim for him to see anything in the room. She sounded quite nervous, but Rory ignored this, and stepped in to through the open door.

He walked in, and saw the assistant standing in front of him, a pistol pointing at her head. Holding the pistol was Bone, the American in the cloak that Rory had met that night.

"So glad that you could join us, Rory." He giggled "My little friend here did just what I wanted. Now then, if you want to save her, you and I are going to play a little game!"

"Whatever game you have in mind, I doubt I'll want to play" Frowned Rory

"Oh, just a Shadow game." Laughed Bone "And every life point you lose will rot some of your flesh away."

"Surely it will rot away yours as well, that seems fair." Rory suggested, a grim frown still on his face.

"Oh, that would be hard." Laughed Bone, throwing down his cloak. Beneath it there was no skin, but a skeletal man, with insects and maggots writhing around him. "You see, I have no flesh."

Rory's frown turned to a fearful gaze, as he looked on at this sight of pure terror. Bone lifted his cloak and slung it around his shoulders, masking the bugs on his torso, but leaving his skull in plain view.

"So then, are you going to start or am I?" Questioned Bone, cracking his knuckles.

Rory chuckled to himself "You can begin. You're deck can't be that powerful anyway. What does it focus on, Skull servants?"

Rory let out an enormous burst of laughter.

Bone smirked. "Be careful what you wish for." As he said this, he tapped a button on his wrist, and the pair of them vanished, reappearing on the academy roof. The sky was completely black, with stars shining throughout. The island looked so small from this high up, except for the volcano, which was still towering above Rory.

Bone pulled a card from his duel disk. "Excellent!" He grinned "I'll place two cards face-down, set a monster and end my turn."

Rory sniggered. He too drew a card. "Ok, then, time to see what a real duellist does!" Rory mocked

"But it isn't my turn yet." Interrupted the skeletal creature.

Rory frowned, and slapped a monster on to his duel disk. "I summon La Jinn, the Mystical genie of the lamp!" Rory cried, as an enormous green genie appeared next to him, its hands covered in jewels. "Now my jinn attacks your face-down monster."

The great monster lumbered forwards, launching an enormous purple blast of power at the card. Before the blast hit, a small skeleton in a purple cloak appeared, much like Bone. Within seconds it was engulfed and destroyed.

"What was that?" Laughed Rory "You really do play a skull servant deck!" Rory collapsed to the floor, unable to contain his laughter. After a few minutes, he managed to drag himself up, wiping tears of joy from his eyes.

"Well if you weren't too busy laughing; you'd have noticed my trap card, next to be lost. It allows me to select one monster on my field, choose another from my deck and send it to the grave!" Bone smiled "Which means that since I activated it when you attacked, I now have two skull servants in my graveyard."

"Well, I don't see how that is relevant, so I'll end my turn." Said Rory, still chuckling silently.

"My draw." Bone muttered, lifting a card. He smiled. "And it's one of my favourites. I use graceful charity. I can draw 3 cards, but I have to burn away two afterwards."

"I don't see why it's your favourite." Rory frowned, as an angel appeared, and three cards bounced from bone's deck to his hand.

"It's my favourite because it lets my throw away a third skull servant, and a king of skull servants." Bone said, as another smile lit up his face.

Rory suddenly stopped laughing. He had just remembered 'king of skull servants' effect. "Wait, but why did you destroy that monster? If you'd have kept it, you could have summoned a 3000 attack point monster!" Rory went pale as he said this, realising his opponent's strategy.

"Oh. I just thought that I might destroy him so that this one in my hand is even more powerful. You see, my king of skull servants gains 1000 attack for every skull servant in my graveyard, but he also gains 1000 for every king in my graveyard. That gives this one 4000 attack points! And I think that I'll summon him right now!"

The academy began to shake. A small skeleton appeared in a dark purple cloak, but it glowed with energy, growing larger and fiercer. When it stopped growing, the shaking stopped, and it was at least fifteen foot tall; it's robes torn and dangling from a few of the joints. Its bones had reformed, and it now had a massive jaw with numerous fangs, as well as mighty talons on its hands. Rory was completely pale as he stood beneath this great creature. He fell to the floor in terror, and Bone let out a burst of villainous laughter.

"My minion, destroy this pest!" Bone yelled, as the beast bounded forwards and smashed in to La Jinn. The genie exploded in to purple ashes which impaled Rory sending him flying backwards towards the edge of the dome. He began to skid backwards, but reached out and grasped the pillar next to him. He heaved and pulled himself up, collapsing again and panting for breath.

But He hadn't been on the floor for a minute by the time he felt another agony kick in. As his arms went to his chest, Rory now lay face down against the floor, remembering the deal that he had made with Bone. He looked down at his hands, and saw them fade and turn green, as he felt the blood flowing beneath them grow cold.

Clutching his arm, Rory slumped upwards, to see an even more terrifying sight in front of him. Bone had removed his cloak, and pieces of flesh were beginning to appear on him. It was Rory's flesh. Half of Rory's face now clung to Bone's skull, and Bones ribs now had a layer of muscle atop them.

"By the way, I forgot to mention. When you lose flesh, I get to keep it." Bone smirked "So I get to come back to life in your form when you pass away. Then I'll attack your friend in your body, and no-one will be able to stop us! The brilliance of Cavvoure's plan!"

"You're a lunatic!" Rory screamed, though he felt his jaw sink slightly as he did so. He could tell that that was also rotting, and the flesh would not be able to hold on to the bone for too long. The second that his flesh fell away, he was as good as dead.

Bone grinned, half of Rory's teeth doing the same. "I believe that it's your turn."

Rory's life points were now at 1800, the attack of his monster. If he had not had it on the field, he would be dead by now. He looked down at his disk, and tried to move his hand to it. There was no feeling in his arm, and it swayed as he tried to balance it. His eyes unfocused and he stumbled.

"It's a bit of a pain at first, but you'll get used to it after fifty years or so as a corpse." Bone said, his single eye glowing in the moonlight.

Rory smacked his hand down, and swung it back, pulling a card with it. He looked down at the card, but could not see it properly. He could only see a hand sticking upwards, but decided to play it anyway. His gut told him it was the right thing to do. It was one of the only parts of his body that he had left, so he had to trust it. "I play a spell card." He murmured, his arm lifting for only a moment before it shrunk to his side again.

"Fissure!" Bone yelped, his eye twitching. "But that will destroy the monster with the lowest attack on my field!"

Rory's eyes refocused. He stood up to his full height, and stared at the card again. "That's right! And since you only have that King of skull servants, it goes away!"

"But you're forgetting my face-down! I use generation shift! It destroys my monster and adds another king of skulls servants to my hand! So you're fissure does nothing!" Bone smirked, though Rory could sense worry on his face.

"That doesn't matter, because you still don't have a monster!" Rory smiled

"Oh but I will. Next turn I will be able to summon a 5000 attack point monster. You won't stand a chance!"

"But for now, I have the field. I'll just need to find a way to stop your next king. Now I summon Shining abyss!" Rory grinned. A large blue creature with golden wings and one bright yellow eye appeared in front of him.

"My monster, attack! Shining radiance!"

The creature beat its wings and an enormous golden wave of energy crashed in to Bone. As it did so, Bone's skin began to fade, leaving only a small portion of Rory's face still attached to him.

"My flesh! My Body! I can't lose it now! I'm so close!" screamed Bone, collapsing to his knees. "No matter. I can still take you now and have your body!"

As Bone's life points hit 2400, Rory placed one card face-down on the field. "I'll play one card face-down and end my turn. And if the heart of the cards are with me next turn, I can banish that king of skull servants that I know you're about to play!"

"But that's the problem. My monster will crush you this turn. There won't be a chance for you to draw a card." Bone giggled "I'll bring out my monster once more!"

Once again, a small skeletal figure appeared, and once again it grew, only this time it grew much bigger. It grew until it was twenty feet tall, and looked like an enormous dragon, with wings of pure bone. Only vague rags hung to it now, and it glowed purple as it skydived downwards towards Rory.

"Now go! Skeletal Surge!" Yelled Bone "Destined, feel your body leave you!"

An enormous purple flame burst from the creature's mouth, rocketing towards Rory. As it closed in, a green energy appeared in front of Rory, holding the blast away. After a few seconds of constant fire, the barrier shattered and only a small portion of the blast came through.

The dust cleared, and Bone could no longer see anyone in front of him. He smiled and began to turn away. Suddenly, he heard a voice from behind him.

"I'm not done yet." Muttered Rory, as he pulled himself back on to the building.

"But my attack! How did you survive my monster?" Bone stuttered

"I activated my face-down card, Waboku. It stops all battle damage, and stops your attack from scratching my monster. The blast nearly sent me flying anyway though, but I managed to get back up. Are you ready to finish this duel?"

Bone chuckled "Fine. You are so eager to be wrenched from your body, I shall not deny your wish. I'll place one card face-down."

"Excellent." Rory mumbled. He struggled again moving his arm to his deck. After a few moments, he had to shift it with his second hand. Pulling the card from the top of his deck, he was breathless. He gazed down, and could barely see anything. He recognised the picture though, and he smiled.

"Now I'm going to win!" He yelled to Bone, who laughed at him

"You're never going to win. The demon DreadRoute shall be brought out upon this realm. You shall die!"

"I shall victor," Rory grinned, blood trickling down his green cheek "Because I have the heart of the cards. I activate soul release."

A white light encompassed the field, covering the two battlers.

"Soul release? What is this? Tell me now!" Shrieked Bone, his eye spinning around at all the light.

"Soul release allows me to select up to 5 cards in either of our graveyards and remove them from play. For example your skull servants and king of skull servants." Rory stated

"I don't see what that will do." Grinned Bone, suddenly turning pale as his creature fell from the sky "Wait, that means that my king doesn't gain a bonus anymore!"

"Exactly." Rory said, propping himself up against one of the pillars on the roof.

The Dragon glowed purple, as the spirits of the skull servants flew out of it. It began to shrink, and turn back in to a normal skeleton, limping to its feet. Its torn rags hung loosely around it, as it stumbled along.

"Next up, I tribute my Shining abyss to summon Swordstalker." Yelled Rory, as a great purple warrior with a large gold sword appeared next to him. "And it will attack your King of skull servants!"

The tiny creature turned to see Rory's Swordstalker launch itself towards it. It let out a shriek, but was quickly silenced by a golden blade flying in to it and splitting it in half.

The sword kept on going, and cut directly in to Bone, sending him flying against a pillar. The creature came back to Rory's side, as Bone slumped to the floor. Bone's life points fell to 400.

Rory smiled through his blood-covered teeth. A single eye rolled across the floor towards him, and he stepped aside so that it could go past. Bone clambered up from the other side of the rooftop, and glared at Rory through empty eye-sockets. His bones were charred, and not a single piece of flesh hung to him. Even the insects had left his torso.

"I guess that makes it your turn." Grinned Rory, looking at the pathetic creature in front of him.

"Indeed." Screamed Bone through gritted teeth. "I activate call of the haunted on my King of skull servants."

The small skeleton reappeared alongside Bone.

"Hello. Your monster still has 0 attack points!" Yelled Rory. " It can't scratch me."

"You should listen to your friend more! There is more than one way to duel. I now tribute my king to summon vampire lord!"

The skeleton disappeared and was quickly replaced by a tall vampiric creature. It had pale skin, and bright blue hair and it was wearing a long, flowing purple cloak, with enormous spines emerging from it. It had 2000 attack points.

"Ha! That's not going to do anything!" Rory smirked "My Swordstalker also has 2000 attack. If you attack, they're both destroyed and you are open to attack next turn!"

"Ah, but I play Violet crystal! It increases my monsters attack by 300." Bone gestured to his vampire as he said this. It glowed bright pink, and its fingers grew to giant talons. "Now, Vampire lord, attack his Swordstalker."

The vampire leapt forwards and tore apart Rory's Swordstalker. Rory himself collapsed to the floor as his face turned green, and his life points hit 1500. As he looked down, he expected to see green fungus all over him, but instead, he was glowing purple.

"Next, my Vampires effect activates!" Bone smiled "And that means that you select a monster in your deck and send it to the graveyard!"

Rory began to look through his deck for his weakest monster, when he remembered Richard's words. _There's more than one way to duel. _The phrase rang in his head as he looked at his cards. He grinned, and grabbed a card, tossing it to his graveyard.

"You're wrong by the way!" Laughed Rory "I do listen to Richard. And I can play like no other duellist on the planet!"

Bone let out a burst of evil laughter "You are a fool. You cannot win. Surrender. I shall give you a turn, then I shall eliminate you."

"That's all that I need!" Smiled Rory. "I activate Monster Reincarnation! By sending a card from my hand to the graveyard, I can bring any monster in my graveyard back to my hand!"

Bone smirked "It's not like you having anything there that could save you anyway!"

"How wrong." Smiled Rory "I choose Chaos Emperor Dragon – Envoy of the end!"

Bone stepped backwards. "How did that get in there?" He muttered in his American Accent.

"It was the card that your vampire sent away. And Now it returns to win me the duel!"

"But that means that you planned this!"

"Exactly. I remove from play my Swordstalker and my Shining Abyss to summon my Emperor Dragon!"

A storm cloud began to appear above the academy. Bolts of lightning crashed to the ground, as rain dropped on to the roof. Chaos Emperor dragon hovered down from above, its blue skin lit up by the lightning. Rory pointed at the vampire Lord, and instantly, the dragon launched a blast of pure energy at it.

The energy tore it up, splitting it in to pieces, and blasting Bone backwards. Bone flew from the rooftop, holding his hands backwards, now hovering in the sky. His life point counter hit 0.

"I lose but live on through my curse." Bone giggled "I tried playing fair, so now I'll just have to cheat."

Bone lifted a pistol to Rory. He smiled. "Rory Lionheart, prepare to die."

Rory looked on in terror, and time slowed as the gun fired. The bullet seemed to take a lifetime to pass over the rooftop, towards Rory. He leapt sideways, but the bullet hit his shoulder, piercing it and flying on through. Rory collapsed. He could still see Bone from his new position.

Bone growled. He reloaded the gun and took aim again. Just before he shot, a bolt of lightning flew down from the storm cloud. It completely encompassed Bone, who only had time to curse once before he was ripped to shreds.

Rory lay still for a moment, smiling to himself about his survival. He stood up, and began to limp towards the ladder to the main academy. He needed to go to the hospital ward. He needed to find Richard. Luckily, they were in the same place.


	8. The Spirit Strikes

Chapter 8

The boy was running. He did not know what from, but it was closing in. He reached the steps to his door and thrust it backwards, climbing inside. He slammed the door behind him, leaning against it for a moment, out of breath. He could feel it against the other side of the door and he stepped backwards away from it.

He was terrified, and could barely breathe but for his will to survive. He could see the silhouette of the creature on the other side of the door, and watched it as it slowly shifted its weight around the steps. It let out a small growl, like a purr, but it was vicious.

It moving backwards away from the steps, and the boy let out a sigh of relief. He began to stand up, when he heard it charging at the door again. He turned and ran, but the door split under the creature's claws.

It was inside now. He had nowhere to run; there was nowhere he could go that it couldn't. He was now sitting in his room, and the beast was only a few metres away, in the corridor, sniffing him out. In a few moments, he would be dead.

Then something happened. Something worse than him dying. His front door clicked open, and his parents walked in to the house, chatting happily. Within seconds, the beast had galloped down the stairs and was upon them. They had had no time to run. They were already as good as dead.

The boy began to cry; soft tears falling from his cheeks. He crept, almost silently in to the next room to pick up the phone, but as he did so he heard the screams from below, and began to shake. He could hear his parents' cries for help as they were wrenched limb from limb.

He clutched the phone, and called for the police and an ambulance. The police arrived vigilantly, and managed to capture the beast. The ambulance came later, and was far too late to save the two people.

The boy was now with two police officers. They were incredibly friendly, but it couldn't stop the pain. He watched as the creature was placed in a cage to be taken away to a zoo. It had been a bear, which had come out of the woods in search of food.

Richard awoke with a start, covered in sweat and tears. The memories of his past were not pleasant ones. That event was why he was here. He had originally blamed the bear, but then had questioned himself. He thought to himself.

"Why did the bear have to leave the woods for food?"

After a few months of searching the internet at the orphanage, he discovered that it had been due to a new building being constructed in the woods, destroying half of the trees and the animals that lived there's food supplies. That building had been a duel arena, ordered by Seto Kaiba.

That is why he needed to become king of games. If he could, he could stop the construction of anything that would damage animal habitats. Anything that could make another child relive the tragedy that he had lived through.

Richard looked around the hospital wing. Opposite him was Ted, still blood-drained. Wolf was in a cornered off area in another room, but to his surprise, Richard now saw Rory beside him. Rory was covered in green scabs, and had blood all over his face. He had an enormous cast over one shoulder, which was red with the blood emerging from beneath.

Richard looked at the time. It was 6 o'clock, but the lights still weren't on. He assumed that the nurses were late arriving. That meant that someone else must have been injured. He wondered if it was the second emissary. He looked back at Rory again, and wondered what had happened to him in the few hours that they had been separated.

As Richard looked down at Rory, he heard something from the corridor. Someone was walking along, towards the hospital wing. He crouched down, and crept to the door, pressing his ear against the keyhole.

"We have 20 hours left. How many have you captured?" spoke one voice, which Richard instantly recognised. It was Damien.

"I have 30 by this hour, lord." The second voice was slightly faint, and Richard had never heard it before.

"What of Rory and Richard? How have you planned to dispose of them?" Damien continued

"Rory is in desperate danger after brother Bone's contribution. He should be dead by midnight."

"What about Richard?"

"I attempted to weave his past as a weapon, though his will is too strong. He survives. I must eliminate him in a duel."

Richard gasped. Though the creature with Damien was speaking in riddles, Richard could tell what he meant. That thing had tried to use the memories of his past to kill him in his sleep.

"Spirit, if you wish to defeat him, you must take a new form. You're old one grows feeble." Damien stated to the other person

"Yes my lord. I have already planned for one who I shall possess. But are the 30 enough for your preparation ceremony?" Spirit murmured

"That should be sufficient, though I would supply me with at least 20 more to be secure." At this, Richard heard footsteps as Damien walked away.

"Oh no." whined Spirit "It would seem that I am overheard. Well, those creatures that pry shall feel their own demise. Young one, feel my blade."

Richard leapt to the side, with only seconds to spare, as a large sword flew in to the door, hitting the ground where he had just been. Moments later, the door swung open and the lights turned on, as three nurses walked in to the room. Richard jumped up and tuned to one of them.

"Did you just see that person outside the room? What did he look like?"

"What man? You must be imagining things with your pain." The nurse muttered, stepping past Richard in to the room.

"But he was just there! Look, he threw a sword in to the room!" Richard roared, pointing to the ground, where there was no nothing. He blinked; staring puzzled at the place where he had just seen the sword.

"You're just delusional, you need your sleep. Try not to wake the other patients; this one was up on the roof last night duelling some gangster. Stupid thing, being up in the middle of the night, duelling. And with the school set to close in six days, it's just foolish!"

Richard did not listen to her talking; he just looked at Rory, and thought to himself. He knew he was right. Spirit said that Bone had fought with Rory, and the nurse had confirmed it then by saying that Rory was duelling someone last night. He just had no idea how Spirit had pulled off the disappearing act.

What troubled him most was that he had heard Damien's first sentence. 'We have 20 hours'. Richard wondered what that meant. Was it 20 hours until he activated his plan, and summoned this evil duel spirit? Richard couldn't leave it to chance. He had to defeat the third and fourth emissary's as soon as possible. If he was correct, they were Spirit and Damien, which meant that he would have to hope Rory came to, as he was the only one with experience of duelling Damien. If he didn't, then this could mean the end.

Richard removed it from his mind, and lay down in bed once more. After 30 minutes, Jaden arrived, and stumbled in to the room. Richard could tell that he was angry.

"Richard! How dare you!" he yelled "I heard from Crowler that you and Rory have each taken out an Emissary of darkness. I wanted to fight all of them, and you've taken two of the best ones! First, you fight that werewolf and his Lycanthrope monster, and then Rory goes off and fights a 5000 attack point king of skull servants! This is so unfair!"

Richard looked up at Jaden and blinked. "Jaden, have you seen Rory? You could have ended up like him, or worse. Do you really want to mess around with these emissaries?"

"I'm not messing around!" He shouted "I'm just having fun. There's a difference. Anyway, Chancellor Shepherd wants to see us again. Are you ready to ditch this hospital place?"

Richard stretched his arms and yawned. "Fine. Just let me get dressed and I'll head upstairs."

Moments later, the pair walked in to Chancellor Shepherd's office, where he was sitting, talking to the head of security, and a very scared looking secretary.

As they approached the desk, he turned and smiled.

"Hello boys. I trust you feel better after last night, Richard?"

"I'm fine." Richard smiled "Why did you call us here?"

"I need to know what you've found out so far about Damien and the emissaries. I understand that you and Rory Lionheart have each removed one."

Richard grinned, and recounted the events of the previous night as rapidly as he could, then telling Chancellor Shepherd about the conversation that he had overheard that morning, and about how they potentially only had 19 hours until Damien's monster was summoned.

"That is definitely strange." Muttered Chancellor Shepherd, rubbing his chin "But since the other two Emissaries were duel spirits, do you think that the third is as well?"

"It's very likely." Richard stated, also thinking heavily. "So the monster has a sword, and can move quickly without being seen. He needs to use bodies as hosts, so he might be spectral."

"Wait a minute!" Jaden piped in "I don't know about the spectral thing, but elemental hero wildheart has a sword, and he's stealthy!"

"Good point." Proclaimed Chancellor Shepherd "You two go and find Spirit then, and then you can duel him. Hopefully Wolf shall awaken soon to give us some help."

Jaden and Richard left, heading back to Slifer. Richard decided to investigate in to what Damien was doing on the way, so he snuck off out of the main gate.

He pressed himself down against the grass, sliding along the floor on his stomach, edging slowly towards the Obelisk blue boys dorm. He slipped up behind a tree, only metres from the buildings front. Richard peeked around the sides, and to his joy, there were no Obelisks at the front of the building.

He ducked down low and ran to the entrance, checking that no-one caught him entering. When he was inside, he pressed against the wall and moved quickly and quietly down the corridor towards Damien's room. It was on the second floor, so to keep quiet, Richard took the stairs. When he was half way up, he heard footsteps and had to leap behind a pillar so as to avoid two Obelisk boys chatting about rare cards.

When they had passed, and their footsteps were completely gone, Richard once more sprinted away down the next corridor. He arrived at Damien's room, and as he had expected, it was locked. He had prepared for this. He pressed a small piece of clay in to the lock, and waited for it to harden, hiding behind another pillar. When it was hardened, he twisted a large part that he had left out of the lock around, and the door swung open.

Richard removed his fake key, and proceeded in to the room. It was a normal room, with a luxurious bed, a desk and a computer. On one wall there was a poster of the king of games, Yugi Motuo, with a dark magician.

Richard did not know what he was looking for, but began to search, slipping on two black gloves, so as not to leave fingerprints. As he lifted books and tipped mattresses, he replaced everything perfectly, so that no-one could sense his presence here.

Eventually, he lifted the poster on the wall, and discovered a large circular safe. He had clearly found what he was looking for. It had a combination lock, and there would be too many combinations for Richard to guess. He would have to return when he had a way to blast it open.

Richard replaced the poster and crept out of the room, gently closing the door, as if trying to hide himself from what was in the room, before relocking it with his clay key.

Richard began to walk out the way he had come, but a small Obelisk first-year came up the stairs.

"Hey you! Stop there!" yelled the boy, running at Richard.

Richard turned, and ran towards the window at the end of the corridor. He thrust it open and looked down. There was a straight drop to the floor, and a drain pipe that ran down from the roof. He turned around again, to see that the Obelisk was producing a mobile phone to take his picture as evidence. He gulped, and clasped the drain pipe firmly, sliding down it to the ground below.

He yelped as the pipe burnt his hands, and fell the last section. He hit the ground with a thump, rolling and climbing instantly to his feet, leaping off in to the shrubs.

Richard decided to return via the hospital wing, to see if Wolf was awake yet, and also because that meant that the Obelisk would not find him if he went straight to the Slifer dorm.

When Richard arrived, he was delighted to see that Wolf was indeed awake, though he was attached to numerous respiratory machines. Rory was still unconscious, but his vital signs were good.

"Wolf, good to see you up!" Richard smiled, approaching his beds.

"All thanks to you and your friend." Wolf grinned, though he did not look that pleased, with blood stains thick in his grey fur. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"We need to know about the other emissaries." Said Richard, suddenly serious.

"Well, Bone is the second emissary, but I heard that Rory disposed of him, putting himself at risk to do so. As you may have guessed, Cavourre is the fourth emissary, and he uses vicious water monsters to win quickly. The third emissary is called Spirit, and he is potentially the most dangerous. He can take other being's forms, and use their powers. Last time I knew he was in the form of elemental hero Wildheart. He took him for the sword."

"Yes, I nearly got that sword stuck in me." Richard frowned

Wolf raised a furry eyebrow "Really? Well he uses a powerful deck that focuses around his real form. That's all I know. I never thought that anyone would get far enough to fight him. But it is important that you do not trust anyone. He will possess the forms of those you are closest to. Last time I heard, he said he was after a boy called Yuki."

Richard gasped "Jaden!" he yelled, running from the room, to Wolf's bemusement. Richard sprinted down the corridors, heading for the Slifer dorm. He arrived outside the building, and looked down at his watch. He had left Jaden at 7am, and it was already 1 in the afternoon. Anything could have happened by now.

He could see Jaden, with 5 Slifers in tow. He was taking them towards the forest. "Jaden!" Richard yelled "What are you doing?"

"I'm taking these young men to get their games on, and throw down some cards in an ultimate Slifer-only tournament!"

Richard laughed "Spirit, Jaden doesn't talk like that!"

"Ahh!" Spirit roared, his eyes glowing red. "Fine then, I shall duel you for their souls. If you win, they live, but if you lose, not only do I get their souls, but I also get yours. How does that sound?"

"Fine then, third emissary. Prepare to be eliminated! And when I'm done with you, I'll take out Damien, and end this little plan of his."

Spirit let out a thunderous laugh "Foolish mortal. This plan has been set aside for Millennia. We waited in the darkness, for a mortal who could lead us to greatness, and then he came. Cavourre cast us from our prison, and unleashed us. Dreadroute was his goal, and in only 12 hours, he shall be free to destroy this universe, like he did to the previous 3 he visited."

"Dreadroute?" Richard asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Wolf really hasn't told you anything has he? The demon Dreadroute was a defect in existence, the ultimate duel spirit, which could rip away power to harvest it. He was born before time, and eliminated two growing universes. Then the ancients tried to seal him, but he returned, breaking free of his prison. Then came the day when the hailed one arrived.

He commanded the spirits to rise against Dreadroute, and they shattered his strength, blasting him in to the darkness. He reached out through me and I recruited Bone and Wolf. He made contact with this realm, and met Cavourre. Now he shall be free."

"I'm so sorry to ruin your plans, but you're going down!" Richard smiled, activating his duel disk, and drawing five cards.

"I'll go first!" Spirit stated coldly "And I'll start by throwing down a face-down monster!"

"Seriously, being Jaden isn't working for you. Give it up!" Richard frowned

Spirit laughed. "I'll show you just how powerful I am in Jaden's body. But for now, it's your turn."

"Draw!" yelled Richard, lifting a card "And what a draw. I summon Battle Ox!"

A tall ox standing on two legs appeared beside Richard, wielding a large stone axe.

"Now my Ox attacks!" Richard said, as the Ox bounded forwards. It smashed its axe down, but the face-down monster appeared in front of it. A large stone warrior appeared.

"Sorry. But you just hit my clayman. And since you only have 1700 attack points, my clayman repels your move!" Spirit laughed

As Richard's life points fell to 3700, he too laughed "I guessed that you had a high defence point monster, so I only used battle ox to flip it up. Now I can use this!"

Richard held up fissure, and clayman shattered right in front of Spirit.

"Curses! I guess you were correct. This body cannot aid me. I shall return to my form!"

Spirit drew a card, and Jaden's body glowed, as the card appeared on the field. "I summon my Mucus Yolk in attack position!" He screamed "And feel the air again!"

Jaden slumped to the floor, and a glowing pile of goo emerged from his mouth, floating in to the air, the duel disk hovering beside it.

"You're a mucus Yolk?" Richard said, stepping backwards. "So you played yourself, but you have zero attack points. It's an amazing effect, but not without attack points."

Spirit laughed eerily, even more so than before, as he now had no mouth or face. "That is why I have this. My axe of despair!"

Richard took another step back in fear. "You're kidding. That gives your mucus yolk an extra 1000 attack points!"

"Exactly. And its special effect allows me to attack with it directly. So here I go!"

The small creature charged forwards through the air, a large wooden axe appearing next to it. Richard's battle ox held up its blade, ready to defend, but the yolk vanished, reappearing in front of Richard. It swung the axe, slashing in to Richard's arm, and causing a curtain of blood to seep out.

The small creature glowed, suddenly doubling in size. Richard felt another surge of pain, and collapsed to the ground, as more blood crept from his wound, and his previous injuries opened to spill even more blood.

"You see, my Yolk doesn't just hurt you. It absorbs your energy, and gains 1000 attack points, which leaves you with 2700 life points, and my Yolk with 2000 attack points. The match is already nearing its end. I'll end my turn by setting one card face-down."

Richard limped upwards, and reached for the top card of his deck, his duel disk now covered in blood. He was beginning to get feint. He could hardly see, and his hands were completely red.

"Excellent." He muttered to himself, seeing the card. "I use Dian Keto the cure master! This gives me back 1000 life points!"

As Richard said this, he glowed bright green, and felt his wounds cover up slightly, stopping a further pint of blood from seeping from them. Nevertheless, he was still covered with the blood from the previous attack against him, as his life points rose to 3700.

"Ok, then. I tribute my Battle ox to summon saber beetle. Looks like you're about to lose your own form!"

The large brown beetle appeared, its horn already glowing, as it leapt at the mucus Yolk. Just before it hit the creature, a green barrier appeared in front of it.

"I use Waboku!" yelled Spirit "It makes all damage dealt to my monster zero until the end of the turn."

The sabre beetle returned to Richard's side.

"Fine, then. I have enough life points to spare another attack, so I'll just set a card and end my turn."

Spirit drew a card, smiling. "I activate a second axe of despair!"

Spirit glowed. His yolk form grew larger again, and a second axe appeared next to it.

"Next I'll attack you directly again!" Spirit yelled, zooming forwards, once more vanishing as he reached the beetle, before blasting himself in to Richard and sending him launching against the ground.

As Spirit reappeared on his side of the field, Richard once more felt the horrific feeling of warm blood trickling down him. With only 700 life points left, Richard needed to finish the match this turn. He had seen the cards that he needed in his hand to win the match; he just needed to draw a strong enough monster now.

"In case you'd forgotten, my mucus yolk now has 4000 attack points, so you'll need a nearly invincible force to eliminate him. I shall end my turn. You have only got one of them left."

With this, spirit let out a burst of uncontrollable laughter. He was now as large as the Slifer dorm beside him, and the two axes were almost invisible next to his massive size.

"Fine then," Richard said, as he looked at his hand, he grinned. "You know. I learnt something from Rory. There is more than one way to win. My usual strategy is to sneakily win, but this time, I'll win through brute force. I summon Destroyer golem!"

A stone soldier with brass knuckles appeared next to the sabre beetle, cowering in fear at the enormous creature before him.

"You foolish mortal, that creature is far too weak to scratch me!" Spirit bellowed, his scratchy voice echoing throughout the west side of the island. "It has only 1500 attack points."

"That's why I'm tributing it!" Grinned Richard.

"You can't, you used up your summon with that measly beast!"

"Oh can't I?" Richard said, as he flipped his face-down card face-up. "By using Ultimate offering, I pay 500 life points to have one additional summon. So I tribute my golem to summon judge man!"

Richard's life dropped to 200. The golem shattered, and Richard's judge man appeared beside him.

"Yet another waste." Spirit laughed "1500 to 2200 is still not enough!"

"I'm still not done yet!" Smirked Richard "I use my megamorph!"

A large brown stone tablet appeared behind Judge man. He shone in the sun, and his attack points rose to 4400.

"You see, if my life points are lower than yours, I can double that tack of my monster." He smiled "And now I'll use gift of the martyr. By tributing my Sabre beetle, I can increase my Judge man's attack to 6800!"

The Judge man grew enormous, as Richard's sabre beetle exploded. The club wielding warrior plunged forwards, smashing Spirit's Mucus yolk form with his shimmering club.

Jaden lurched upwards again, Spirit once more in his body. His life points immediately shot down to 1200. "I live on." He murmured, through clenched teeth.

"Not for long!" Richard grinned "I use linear acceleration cannon! It destroys my Judge man, and deals half of his attack to you instantly. And since he has 6800, that means that you say goodbye."

Judge man exploded, and with it, an enormous blast of energy went rocketing towards Spirit, and as it hit him, he blasted straight out of the back of Jaden's head, splatting against a tree and exploding.

Richard smiled, before collapsing to the ground, his face pale from blood loss. Jaden ran over, looking around and rubbing his head, unaware of what had happened to him over the past few hours, before hoisting up Richard and dragging him to the hospital wing.


	9. The Fourth Emissary

Chapter 9

Damien was standing in his vault, the swirling purple portal metres from him. He ran at the portal, but as he got closer, he was slowed by the force pressing against him. He was unable to reach it, and knew he wouldn't. He had tried a hundred times to get inside, and free Dreadroute that way, but he wasn't going to succeed.

He turned to a piece of paper that Spirit had given him. It had a list of all the names required, and only 5 or so duellists were missing. He would have to take things in to his own hands, capture the last people, and summon Dreadroute. It was his destiny.

Richard sat up in the bed. It was 8pm. He had been out for six hours, and he needed to stop Damien. He remembered what Spirit had said. The demon Dreadroute would rise at just after midnight. That gave him 4 hours. He needed to search Damien's room again.

He stood, but instantly fell to the floor again, clutching his side in agony. He had almost forgotten how close to dying he had been, but he still needed to go anyway. Still holding his side, Richard limped out of the hospital and back to his room.

Half an hour later, Richard was outside Damien's door. He had checked at the window, and Damien wasn't in, but he had to move fast anyway. He slid the key in to the lock and thrust the door open. Once more he approached the poster, only this time he ripped it from the wall.

Richard removed a small pocket knife, and jammed it in to the top of the safe, and twisted it round the edge. He yanked it out, and attempted to pull the door open, but it was still jammed. Richard looked around the room. There had to be another way.

Seeing what he needed, he ran to Damien's desk, and picked up a spare card. He placed it directly above the key pad, and pushed in each of the four corners.

The card hit all of the buttons at the same time, and the door slipped open. Richard looked in to the vast, cylindrical safe, and found that there was a tube connecting a second room.

He clambered in to the tube, and pushed himself along, until he stood on the other side.

He was in a dark room, with only one light source, an enormous swirling purple vortex at the opposite end of the room. As a great and fierce roar echoed from it, Richard knew he had found the link to Dreadroute.

Damien returned to his room, checking off the last names on the list. He had succeeded, and now all he needed was sufficient duelling energy to summon Dreadroute, and eliminate those pests who opposed him.

He was walking slowly up the stairs, savouring his victory, when a deep, thunderous cry came from down the corridor. Damien immediately recognised it, and within seconds he was at his room, staring at the vault which had been opened, and clumsily left open.

Damien scowled, and then something clicked in his mind. He smiled, throwing himself almost all the way through the tube in one go.

"The fourth Emissary is here. Don't you want to duel me?" mocked Damien, as Richard edged closer towards the portal, his face contorting. "I'm sorry, but that won't work. You'll have to defeat me to destroy Dreadroute."

Richard turned "So be it. I have collected a few more cards and improved my deck, so there's no way that you can beat me."

"Then it's time for the end!" Damien roared, as a strange light consumed the two boys. As the light faded, Richard found himself atop a large stone column. In front of him were ten more columns, which he assumed were for his cards, and Damien also had the same feature. The pillars were protruding from a sea of shadows, which stretched far in to the distance.

Damien and Richard's duel disks snapped in to position, and they yelled "Duel" in unison. Damien grinned evilly.

"This is your final challenge, Richard." He smirked "If you can defeat me that means the end of Dreadroute. Are you up to the ultimate challenge? This is probably the most important duel of your life."

"Don't try to intimidate me, Damien. It may have worked on Jaden, but it won't work on me. Since you need all the help that you can get, you can play first."

Damien smiled, brushing off Richard's insult. He drew a single card from his deck without looking at it, and tossed it to the field, looking at it briefly.

"I summon unshaven angler in attack position."

"Sorry, but that only has 1500 attack points. I could easily wipe that thing away, and your life points with it." Richard interrupted.

"Ah, but that isn't all." Damien continued, as if he had not heard Richard. "I also use my field spell, a legendary ocean! It gives my angler a boost of 200 attack and defence points."

The monsters attack jolted to 1700, and a wave crashed in through the darkness, creating a vast ocean beneath the arena. The enormous spiked fish ducked down below the surface, circling one of Damien's pillars.

"That will be all for now." Damien stated coldly, though Richard could see that there was more to Damien's plan from how cocky he was.

"Fine then." Laughed Richard "If that's all that you can do, then I'll have to remove your power. I activate de-spell, and eliminate your ocean for good!"

The water glowed for a moment, before shattering, leaving the angler hovering in thin air.

"Next up," grinned Richard "I summon my Royal keeper in attack position."

A tall, zombified man appeared alongside Richard, standing on the central pillar, glaring at the fish in front of it.

"He has 1600 attack points, so he'll make quick work of your angler."

The monster leapt in to the air, blasting a small energy at Damien's fish. It exploded, and Damien's life hit 3900, with only a slight twitch.

"Is it my turn yet?" asked Damien, showing no sign of failure at all.

Richard stared at Damien. He had just lost his monster and his field bonus, as well as 100 life points, and he was not vaguely concerned. This made Richard worried. Each of the emissaries had used a sneaky strategy. Wolf had attacked with two Fenrirs to stop Richard from advancing his field. Bone had made his monster stronger through defeat, and Spirit had protected his yolk until it was strong enough to win the match for him. Richard was certain that Damien, as the fourth emissary, would try a similar strategy.

"Go ahead." He said plainly, trying to make sure that Damien couldn't see his fear.

"You're scared" Damien grinned, drawing a card "I would be too. You stand no chance against me. I know! I'll go easy on you. I set one monster in face-down defence position, and end my turn."

Richard was still confused by Damien's strategy. He was unaware if Damien was taunting him for a later point, or if he was trying to activate his plan. He couldn't risk leaving the monster on the field.

"I'll attack your monster with my Royal keeper!" Richard roared, after drawing his card.

The keeper once more leapt in to the darkness above the arena. Just as it was about to blast the energy, the creature that it was aiming at appeared. It was a black grizzly bear, with enormous menacing claws.

Richard froze. Two things instantly hit his mind. First, he remembered his childhood. He remembered watching as the bear had torn apart his family. At the same time, he realised it was the same card as Wolf had used in their duel, and was about to cry out, when he realised he had collapsed in fear.

He was crouched on the pillar, his hands wrapped tightly around his knees. He suddenly blushed, and leapt to his feet, as the bear burst in to pieces.

Damien was watching him, laughing silently. Richard couldn't tell if he was laughing because his plan had succeeded, or because he had found Richard collapsing so hilarious that he couldn't help himself.

Damien lifted his deck. "You remember my mother grizzly from the duel against Wolf? Well in case you don't, he lets me summon any water monster with less than 1500 attack points in attack mode instantly. So I choose this, my treeborn frog!"

Richard stopped for a moment, and tried to think about what he had just heard. His thoughts were confirmed as a small orange, winged frog appeared alongside Damien, above a pillar to his right. What puzzled Richard was that it had 100 attack points.

"You're wondering why I summoned this." Damien stated, though Richard did not know if it was a question or not. "I just needed some fodder for my next spell card. I use big wave small wave!"

As he said this, an enormous wave crashed towards the duellists from far behind Damien. It smashed his frog instantly, and he began to laugh.

"Wait a minute. First you summon a weak monster, and then you destroy it?" Richard asked, scratching his head

"Yes, but all for the better. You see, that was just the big wave. Next, I have the small wave, the best part. First, Big wave small wave destroys all of my water monsters. Next, I can summon water monsters from my hand equal to the number destroyed. So let me introduce my Levia Dragon – Daedalus!"

With this yell, a second, smaller wave crashed past, stopping in front of Damien and the water fell down to reveal an enormous sea serpent hovering in front of him. It had blue scales, and a row of razor sharp teeth.

The creature floated around Damien, curling its tail round him.

"But that isn't all!" grinned Damien, as Richard's jaw began to drop "Next up, I'll tribute my Daedalus to summon the almighty lord of the sea, Ocean Dragon Lord – Neo Daedalus!"

The Dragon began to glow in an amazing burst of light. As it was obscured from Richard's vision by the burning glow, it began to reform, and as the light faded, there was another enormous serpent in its place. The bottom half was the same as Daedalus, though now a second dragon-like head had emerged from a neck above it. It had enormous clawed hands, and two great tails. In all, it was roughly fifteen foot tall, as it glided down to rest beside Damien.

"Now, my dragon lord is the greatest monster in the game. Not only does he have 2900 attack points, but he also has a game-ending ability. I can destroy an 'umi' on my side of the field, and all competition is eliminated. That gives him the chance to attack directly. However, since I don't have my 'umi' at the present, I'll just have to beat you normally. At least, until I draw the right card."

Damien smirked. He was watching Richard grow more and more pale. Soon, Dreadroute would be released, and his mission would be over.

"Now, even though I don't need to, I'll make my Daedalus stronger with black pendant!" he yelled, as a small purple stone appeared around one of Daedalus' twin necks. "It increases Daedalus' attack by 500, and when it bites the dust, you take the pain. In fact, you lose 500 life points. You might as well surrender, because this is the end. Daedalus Destroyer!"

The arena shook as Daedalus rose in to the sky, obeying its master's command immediately. Its upper head shone as a blast of pure energy flew from it. Before it hit its target however, a second beam joined it from the lower head. They glowed purple under the influence of the pendant, and the beam hit in to Richard's keeper, shattering it like a window. The beam continued to fly forward, and hit straight in to Richard, who flew up in to the air, spiralling under the beam's strength, and landing in the sea of shadows behind him.

As he thought it was over, he hit on to something hard. Looking down, he could still see the void of darkness, though he moved no further.

"You're confused?" asked Damien raising an eyebrow, but before Richard could respond, Damien answered "We are still standing inside the safe, Richard. I fitted it with the greatest hologram equipment in preparation for this, my endgame. I came fully prepared, but you did not. Face it, you fool, this is the end of the world!"

Damien's maniacal laughter completely covered Richard's life point drop to 2200, but Richard was not listening. He stood up, ignoring the pain, and ignoring Damien. He had found a challenge. A true test of his skills. This was his duty. Richard Capricorn was going to defeat Damien. He was going to crush Daedalus, banish Dreadroute, and he was going to save the world.


	10. The Ocean's Cry

Chapter 10

_LAST TIME… Chancellor Shepherd warned Richard about four emissaries that would try to summon a great demon. Students began to disappear, but Richard duelled Wolf, the first emissary, who joined the heroes upon his defeat. However, the second Emissary, Bone, attacked Rory, and only just lost, sending Rory in to a coma. Richard took out the third emissary, but when he raided Damien's room, he was soon confronted by Damien, the final emissary, who was about to summon the demon Dreadroute. Richard got off to a bad start because of Damien's Daedalus, but can he turn it around and save the world?_

It was a sunny day. The boy was in the middle of a long queue, his black hair glittering in the sun. But the wait was worth it. He was going to see his idol. His hands were shivering from excitement as the receptionist cried out for him to enter.

He wandered in to the room, and saw him. Yugi Motuo was sitting in the booth, and he was living out the opportunity of a lifetime. It was a public event. Lots of children, between ages 8 and 15 were allowed. It was a massive duelling event. The king of games was duelling these young duellists to see their potential. And Rory was next.

But this event had happened months ago. Rory was still asleep in his coma, showing no sign of ever waking up. His memories were just dreams now. That was all he had left.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the island, in a hidden safe inside a duel room, there were two more boys. These two boys were in the middle of a duel that could decide the fate of mankind.

"It's your turn now." Smirked Damien "Though it'll make no difference. My Ocean Dragon Lord has 3400 attack points now, so you are going to fall next turn."

If Richard didn't do anything, Damien would be right. He only had 2200 life points, and if Damien could play a second strong monster, he would be able to attack directly. Even worse, if Damien drew 'Umi' he could cleanse the field and guarantee his success. Richard needed to think fast.

"Ok, then." He began, feeling the pressure sink in. "I'll summon my Alien infiltrator, and play two cards face down."

"Is that all? You play a monster with 800 attack and all you back it up with is two face-downs? You're pathetic!"

"But my monster has an effect!" Richard roared, though he was still panicking "I can attack directly with it, so long as you have no cards opposite it on your field."

Damien looked at the field. His monster was on the right side of his field, but the alien creature was also on the right of the field. Richard's right. As he observed this, the creature leapt in to the air, lifting two small guns and lunging in to Damien's open flank.

As it reached Daedalus, it turned to face Damien and opened fire, flying through the air. After its bombardment, it returned to its position. Damien barely flinched as his life points dropped to 3100.

"That was good, Richard." Damien smiled "But it was too little, too late. My Daedalus will crush you and your monster."

"Well, if you think you can, then it's your turn." Richard laughed.

Damien ignored his opponent's joy. He would eliminate the infiltrator, and the resulting damage would win the match and bring out Dreadroute. He had won before he had begun. Placing his hand on his deck, he drew his next card.

"My draw!" yelled Rory, as he faced down the two warriors before him. On his left, he saw Dai Grepher, and on his left, the equally terrifying Neo the magic swordsman.

Both had 1700 attack points, and had attacked Rory directly the previous turn, leaving him with 600 life points. He had nothing to defend him, and still had to deal 3500 damage to win.

He smiled as he played the card he had drawn. "I summon my La Jinn, mystical genie of the lamp!"

The green jinn hovered beside Rory, and only moments after struck down Grepher, under Rory's command.

"Excellent strategy." The king of Games smiled "However, I use my call of the haunted!"

The warrior appeared alongside Yugi once more, but soon vanished along with Neo.

"I tribute my two monsters to summon my Dark magician!" he yelled

The familiar purple wizard appeared in front of Rory, who froze up. He couldn't believe that he was fighting one of the most terrifying cards in duel monsters.

Just before the energy ball hit him, he activated his trap, negate attack, and saved himself. He wouldn't last much longer.

Damien smiled at his card. It was no use to him, but he was winning anyway. In fact, he was about to win. About to summon Dreadroute. This was the culmination of his entire life's work. From spending a hundred pounds on his deck, to building his incredible hologram machine.

"Not much left to do." He grinned "So I won't waste your time. Daedalus Destroyer!"

As the enormous serpent pulled back its head, about to launch an enormous blast of power at Richard, time seemed to go slowly. Just slowly enough so that the beam didn't have time to strike. Seconds before it hit, Richard readied his hand over one of his face-down cards.

"I activate Waboku!"

The shield lifted, but Damien was not discouraged. "Fine, then I'll just take you out next turn. You have one more turn. Prepare your last prayers."

As Richard drew his card, he felt a surge of energy shoot through him. This was his chance. The power came from his friend. He had to win this to save Rory, he knew it.

"I tribute my infiltrator to summon sabre beetle."

"Not good enough." Damien smirked "You need 1000 more attack to win this battle!"

"Then I guess I'm bad at math, because I attack your Daedalus."

"You're attacking? You have some nerve, challenging my Daedalus! But if you have a death wish, I shall not refuse it to you."

The sabre beetle leapt towards Daedalus, its horn glowing. Just before it hit, Richard flipped up his second face-down card.

"I activate level conversion lab!" yelled Rory, rolling a dice. He rolled a three, and smiled "Now I can summon my Curse of Dragon! But that's not all, I use gift of the martyr, to tribute my jinn and give my dragon 3800 attack!"

The bone dragon lunged forwards, splitting Dark magician in half.

"What?" cried Yugi, as his life points dropped "You defeated my dark Magician?"

"Yes, and now I, Rory Lionheart am going to win this match!"

The king of games drew his card. "I activate my monster reborn, and bring back my faithful servant once more. Now return, Dark Magician!"

The purple spell caster once more hovered down from the sky, and Rory frowned. He was going to lose this time.

Richard's card flipped. "I activate collected power!" It allows me to choose one monster and equip every equip card to it. So I'll choose my sabre beetle."

Damien's serpent's attack dropped, whilst the beetle gained 500 attack, and as the two monsters collided, a great cloud of dust rose around the two creatures, blocking them from sight.

Richard's life points dropped, and Damien smiled. "Ha! My monster won, and your life points dropped."

"Are you so sure about that?" Richard smiled, as the dust cleared, and there were no monsters left. "You see, your Daedalus lost 500 attack points, and my beetle gained 500. That gave them both 2900, so they were destroyed."

"Then why did you lose life points?" Damien puzzled

Richard laughed "You already said, remember? When black pendant is destroyed, I lose 500 life points. That's why I have 1700."

Damien flinched, annoyed because his opponent remembered more about his own card. "I knew that. I was just testing you."

"Nice cover-up. I'll set a face-down card and end my turn."

"Excellent. I return my old friend treeborn frog from the graveyard. You see-"

"You can return treeborn frog in your standby phase if you have no spell or traps on your field?" Richard interrupted, proud of his vast knowledge

Damien scowled. He was angry now. Richard was starting to get on his nerves.

Yugi was starting to get on Rory's nerves. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't get rid of Dark magician. He had tried attacking it and he had tried destroying it with a spell. That only left using traps.

"I place one card face-down and end my turn."

"Then prepare to lose. I attack with my Dark magician directly."

"Stop there!" Rory yelled, finally victorious "I activate spellbinding circle on your dark magician!"

"No!" Yugi yelled. At first Rory thought he was scared, but then he realised that it was an objection "I activate dark magic attack! It destroys every spell and trap on the field."

Rory frowned, as the magician continued and wiped out the rest of his life points. He had lost. The king of games approached him.

"You are an excellent duellist, though your deck needs more focus. You must have the heart of the cards when you duel, so take this card. Hopefully it will remind you of the importance of faith in your cards."

Rory looked down at the card that had been placed in his hands. It was a 'Chaos Emperor Dragon – Envoy of the end'. His eyes widened in disbelief.

"You can't give me a card this powerful!" he yelled.

"Yes, I can. A friend of mine gave it to me, and now I am giving it to you. You show potential, and could be a great duellist one day. I want this card to be part of it."

Wolf stared from his bed at the boy in front of him. Though he was in a coma, his blank face turned in to a smile. His memories of how he got his greatest card were some of his best. Little did he know that it was the beginning of his mind slipping away. He was dying.

The duel in the safe raged on. Damien and Richard were not far from the end now, and they would both be terrified if they weren't completely controlled by their adrenaline.

"Anyway, I tribute my Treeborn frog to summon Amphibian beast. It has 2400 points, which is enough to destroy you this turn. It's been a blast, but this is over!"

The enormous green, spine-covered creature lumbered forth, leaping in to the air, over the dark gap between Richard and Damien. Just as it was about to reach Richard, he flipped up a card, and Sabre beetle flew up from the void below, crashing in to the amphibian beast. Both monsters were destroyed.

Damien was about to ask how Richard had achieved it, but did not want to look stupid.

"I used my call of the haunted and brought back Sabre beetle. Since they have the same attack, they were both destroyed." Richard grinned "You were about to ask, so I told you anyway."

Damien glared at his opponent, furious at the insults that he was generating constantly. "You should respect me. Next turn, I'll be your murderer. But for now, it's your move."

"Good." Richard stated "I'll summon Battle ox, and equip it with invigoration. That gives it 2100 attack points!"

As Richard talked, a large brown ox standing on its hind legs appeared, and its skin glowed eerily. It jumped forwards, landing on the pillar in front of Damien, and smashing him with its large axe.

This time, Damien spiralled in to the air, his life points dropping rapidly to 1000. He landed on his feet, and walked immediately back to his pillar.

"I'm sorry, Richard. You haven't won. But you've done better than anyone I've ever duelled. I didn't think that I would have to, but I have the perfect card to win this match. I use monster reborn."

"That won't get you far." Richard smirked, interrupting Damien's gloating. "You can't special summon Daedalus, so you have to bring back Amphibian beast, and I could easily take that out again." Richard was bluffing, but he was still convincing.

Unaffected, Damien let out a burst of laughter. "Check the rules, my pitiful friend. A card that cannot be special summoned _can_ be special summoned, but only if the conditions for summoning have already been met during the duel. Since I tributed Daedalus earlier, I can return the ultimate monster, Ocean Dragon Lord – Neo Daedalus, to my field!"

A burst of light shone up from the pit, forcing Richard to turn away, and when he looked back, the evil, twin-headed serpent was in front of him.

"I have two words for you, Richard." Mocked Damien "Daedalus. Destroyer."

The beam shot forth again, met with the second, and wiped out Richard's ox. Unfortunately, the beam continued again. It smashed in to him, knocking him to the floor, and sending his life points down to 900.

"You see, there's no way to win." Chuckled Damien "And I have a feeling that the top card of my deck is a certain 'Umi', so if you don't win this turn, I'll win next time. You have one turn."

"That's more than enough." Smiled Richard, who had just figured out a strategy to win him the duel.

"What?" Laughed Damien "You think that you can destroy Daedalus, defeat me, and save the world? I'd like to see that. Take it away."

Richard smiled. "Okay then. I sacrifice 800 of my life points to bring back one of my monsters with the effect of premature burial."

"No monster in your graveyard can even compete with my Daedalus!" Damien laughed evilly. "Don't prolong the inevitable. You're going to lose!"

"That's why I'm not going to attack Daedalus!" Richard smirked, as a small grey alien creature appeared alongside him. "I'm going to attack you!"

"Damien clapped a few times sarcastically. "Excellent plan. Except you are missing one key ingredient. That little weakling only has 800 attack. I have 1000 life points. You're 200 short. It was a nice try, but not good enough."

"Yeah, like I haven't heard that line before." Giggled Richard "Which is why I have this!"

Richard thrust a card in to the air, and a large rod appeared in the Alien's hands. "My Rod of the mind's eye makes all battle damage that the equipped monster deals to you 1000. So this is the end for you. Goodbye, Damien. It's been fun."

The Alien leapt in to the air, stopping high above Damien. It slammed the Rod in to its gun, pointed the gun directly at Damien, and Fired.

Damien stepped back in terror, as the rod shot through the air, impaling him through the stomach. As Blood seeped from the wound and the holograms faded, his life points hit zero.

Richard grinned. He walked towards Damien, as the room had returned to its original appearance. "Sorry, but good always prevails in the end, Damien. You couldn't win. Dreadroute was banished and he is not coming back."

Damien laughed, clutching his chest in pain. "On the contrary. I gathered the students required. All I needed was the duelling energy. Fortunately, you were here. In trying to stop me, you have provided ample energy to bring back the demon Dreadroute. You have doomed the universe."

With this, Damien removed his hand from his waist, allowing blood to fall from it. He lunged towards the controls for the portal, and slammed his hand down on a large button.

The portal surged with energy, and Richard was forced back by the incredible pressure emerging from it.

Beneath the school, hundreds of students, along with Professor Satyr, were chained to the walls. They glowed as their energy was sucked from them, and channelled in to the enormous piston which they were circling. It began to pump, and the power flowed straight in to the gateway, which now began to steam and hum.

Outside, Jaden and his friends looked up, as the whole academy shuddered under a tremendous force. The roof slid open, and a great cannon-like machine protruded from it.

Back in Damien's safe, Richard collapsed to the floor, as the portal blasted a giant blast of wind at him. "What have you done?" he yelled to Damien, who sat at the opposite side of the room, laughing evilly.

Damien just smiled, and disappeared before Richard's eyes. Pieces of the roof fell, shattering on the hard floor. Richard clambered to his feet, and started to run towards the safe door, but another blast of wind slammed the door shut.

The dust filling the room began to slip in to Richard's lungs, and he started choking. He fell to the ground, his vision blocked by the dust and darkness in the room. Suddenly, a light opened on the other side of the room, and Richard crawled towards it.

He reached it, and looked out in to the sun. It was a hole that had been opened by a falling rock, and he climbed down the rubble. Once outside, he continued to choke, until all of the dust had left his lungs.

He looked up in to the sky above the academy, and stared at what he saw. The large cannon was now fully extended, and a strange purple energy had gathered at its tip.

Jaden, Chumley and Syrus ran over, but before they had time to talk, they were deafened by the sudden collapse of the Obelisk blue boys' dorm.

"What happened?" Asked Jaden

"I duelled Damien. I won, but he summoned Dreadroute." Richard replied "But the building is destroyed. The portal was inside. We've won."

As soon as Richard had finished talking, the purple energy at the top of the cannon turned in to an orb, and launched in to the sky. The energy slowly dispersed, and all four of the Slifers gasped at what they saw.

Standing in mid-air was Damien, his eyes glowing bright red. He hovered down towards the roof, and let out a thunderous cry that echoed throughout the island. "My name is Dark Dreadroute. I am the new master of this world, and I shall duel three warriors here. When I duel them, I shall find my perfect form, and then I shall devour this planet. You have 36 hours until the end. Say your goodbyes, for this is the last day for mankind!"

Jaden turned to Richard. "Rich, you've got to fight him. You're the best duellist out of all of us four, so you need to do this for us."

"No, my deck isn't good enough. I barely beat Damien, and now I have to fight Dreadroute? I won't stand a chance."

"Then my cards are at your disposal!" yelled Syrus, holding out his deck

"Mine too!" Chumley agreed, also holding out his deck.

"Yeah, let's get our games on!" Jaden grinned, holding his cards out.

"Then let's do this." Richard smiled, looking at his friends "Let's save the world!"


	11. Route to Dread

Chapter 11

A dark cloud now hung over the academy. It was hours since Dreadroute, in Damien's body, had made his doom proclamation. He had since relocated to the volcano, which was the centre of the hideous haze above Academy Island.

Richard sat in his room, thinking. In front of him there were 4 decks, and he needed to combine them and create the greatest deck of all time. He needed to make his deck strong enough to destroy Dreadroute, but with no idea of what type of deck he played, Richard was stuck.

He had to see Dreadroute in a battle, but didn't know when or where the first challenge would be. Worst of all, he had no idea of who the first opponent would be. He assumed that Dreadroute would want to fight the stronger duellists, so he saw the teachers as an obvious target.

The Chancellor and Banner didn't really duel, but Crowler always claimed that he was the greatest duellist in the academy, so he would probably be the first challenger. The problem was, Crowler was a terrible duellist. He hid behind his legendary monster, and when he actually succeeded to summon it, it was destroyed turns afterwards.

Richard placed the decks back on the table, lifting only his own before running out of the door and heading for the Obelisk dorm.

Meanwhile, Dr. Crowler was leaving the dorm, contemplating the events, just like Richard had been.

"Hmm, that demon says that he's going to battle the best duellists in the school. That means he'll duel Zane. But maybe he'll duel slacker-boy, and then he'll be destroyed forever and I won't have to worry about him any more."

As Crowler walked along, staring intently at the floor to contemplate this fact, and grinning about the fact that Jaden could be destroyed, he bumped in to someone in his path.

"Get out of my way, can't you see I'm a teacher. It's rude to not pay attention!"

Crowler looked up, screamed, and jumped backwards in to the air when he saw who was in front of him. Standing only inches from him was a sixteen year old boy with brown hair. He was hovering in mid-air about as high up he was far away from the duelling professor, and was surrounded by a glowing dark energy, that emanated from him like a foul stench.

"You are a teacher." The boy stated "The best as I understand. You shall be the first one." The boy stated this coldly, and made sure that even if Crowler had not seen him flying through mid-air earlier that day, he would know him as Dreadroute.

"I accept your challenge." Crowler muttered, terrified "After all, I am a teacher so I must set an example."

"Then let the whole school see what you can accomplish."

A flash of blinding light exploded outwards, coating the two duellists, just as Richard ran up the path towards them. The light continued to expand, until it encompassed the island, and all the students were sucked in to the glow.

Moments later, they found themselves in a massive stadium, in stands that circled around a great platform. Upon further inspection, they were inside the volcano, and the seats had emerged from the sides.

On the arena there were two people. One was a man who had qualified from duelling school high in his class, got a PhD, and become a teacher. His name and picture were relayed on to each of the four enormous screens above the arena, also noting 4000 as his life point total.

After a few moments, the screen switched, and showed his opponent, a confident, enigmatic creature in Damien's body, gazing in to the crowd with its hollow, black orbs of eyes. The word Dreadroute appeared beneath his picture, along with a second 4000 life point total.

Amongst the stands was Richard, who was shocked by this incredible arena like the other students, but also angry with himself that he hadn't gotten to Crowler in time, and that Dreadroute would be able to win the first duel unchallenged. However, this did present a chance for him to see Dreadroute's deck, which would probably be his only chance if he wanted to defeat him and save the world.

The terminals randomly flickered the two duellists' names, before stopping on Dreadroute. After a moment of confusion, it became obvious that it was to decide who would play first.

"So then, you have succeeded in much in your life, mortal. You have a PhD, a teaching post at an illustrious academy, and the rarest cards you could want. But you are missing something. The one thing you want is what beating me will get you. Respect. But you cannot win. It will always be inches from your hands as you try to get it, but it shall be gone forever, never touched by your hands." Dreadroute smirked, reading his opponent's looks and thoughts like a child's story book. "So let me end your suffering. You shall have respect when I have your body."

Each duellist drew two cards, and Dreadroute spoke once more in his cryptic, haunting voice, which held the pain of the billions he had killed. "I summon my Vorse raider in face-up attack position, and play a single card face-down."

"Fine then." The teacher exclaimed "I shall have to defeat you for my pupils. I set one monster in defence position and one spell or trap card."

"So far we are at a stalemate, but I shall break that with my next swift move." Mocked Dreadroute evilly "I summon my chthonian soldier in attack position!"

A small dark skinned soldier covered in thick grey armour appeared alongside the green skinned, black armoured, axe-wielding creature that had already been summoned.

"Next my Vorse Raider shall eliminate your creature!" Dreadroute smiled "Marco!"

"Polo!" cried Crowler, as a giant wall of steel appeared in front of Vorse Raider "Looks like you've just hit my Gear golem the moving fortress! Now you lose 300 life points, and I gain the advantage!"

Dreadroute's life points fell instantly to 3700, though he grinned even more evilly than before.

Crowler flinched, amazed by his opponent's reluctance to fail. "Fine, I'll summon my mechanical chaser in attack position to make up the ranks. Come on out now!"

A large green robot appeared, with many arms each wielding a different tool for killing its enemy's with. "Now he attacks your chthonian soldier!"

Dreadroute's life points fell to 3050, to much cheering from the crowd, though some, including Richard and Bastion Misawa did not smile. They knew the soldier's effect all too well.

"You forget, Mortal." Dreadroute smirked "My monster deals the 650 life point difference to both of us, not just me."

The screen changed again, knocking Crowler's life points down this time, to 3350, as the soldier exploded and his sword flew at Crowler, leaving a large scar across his face.

"Now that it is my turn," grinned Dreadroute, his eerie voice making the hair stand up on Crowler's neck "I shall summon my element soldier in attack position."

A warrior wearing armour and holding a large staff rose beside Dreadroute's vorse raider. "Now I use my shrink card! It reduces your mechanical chaser's attack by half, leaving him with only a measly 925."

The green robot shrank to half its size, barely visible to the students in further back rows. "Next, I'll send in my Vorse Raider to destroy your tin can!"

The enormous beast lumbered forwards, throwing out its axe, which spun through the air, destroying the tiny machine and continuing to hit crowler, knocking him to the floor in agony. Across his chest there was a great scar, from his left shoulder to the right side of his stomach, marking where the blade had struck him. The crowd stood terrified, as Crowler's life points hit 2375, and it became increasingly likely that he would lose.

The axe spun back in to the vorse raider's hand. "Mortal, you are due to die. Without your chaser, you have no monster to attack for you." Dreadroute laughed, his eyes starting to glow and bulge from his head. "As soon as I destroy your gear golem you shall be felled"

"Don't you know how a good army is run?" Crowler giggled "When a soldier falls, you replace him instantly with another!"

As Crowler said this, he slapped a card on to his duel disk, and another green android appeared alongside him. "Now this mechanical chaser is going to attack your element soldier and destroy it!"

"Wrong move!" Dreadroute yelled, flipping up a card "I placed him in attack mode as a trap. Now I use a trap, negate attack! It stops your monster from hurting me, and ends the battle phase, leaving you open for next turn."

The green android lumbered forwards, but his attack was blocked by a barrier, forcing him back to Crowler's side. Crowler was tense, worrying that he was at a disadvantage.

"Now my vorse raider will crush your back-up soldier in to dust!" Dreadroute smirked "And let him lie alongside his brother!"

Once more the axe spun forwards, chopping down the robot and hitting Crowler. This time, however, he only fell to 2325.

"If you're done then I'll take my turn!" Crowler hissed "I summon my Robotic Knight in attack position!"

Dreadroute smiled evilly again "Once more, you've fallen in to my trap! You summoned that monster to destroy my soldier, but it will end in you losing more life points!"

Crowler gasped, but apart from this seemed unfazed, as he gave the order to attack. The golden robot leapt forwards, holding up its sword and bringing it down on the soldier.

The soldier exploded, and Dreadroute's life points dropped to 2950, though no-one in the crowd was smiling, because they knew what was coming next.

Dreadroute drew a card "Excellent." He grinned in his surreal tone "I summon my element saurus in attack position!"

"Why would you do that? Your monster only has 1500 attack, so unless you plan on luring me in to a second trap, summoning him was useless. And I won't fall in to a second trap this time!"

"You forget my monster's effect! For every fire monster on the field, he gains 500 attack, giving him 2000 because of your robotic knight." Dreadroute laughed "And now he'll cut off his nose to spite his face, by destroying your robotic knight, and returning himself to 1500 attack points!"

The brown dinosaur grew, and glowed orange, charging forwards at the knight. He shot out a solid burst of fire, splitting the knight in to. As soon as the robot was slain, however, he shrunk back to his original form, and his attack dwindled to 1500.

"And since your monster had 400 less attack points than my monster, you lose even more life points!"

Crowler felt the fire sink in to his skin, boiling his blood as he fell to 1925 life points. He stood up again, but lost his footing under the intense pain, collapsing to once knee. Once more, he climbed up, breathless, facing down his opponent. This time he did not fall.

"I'll set a monster in face-down defence position and end my turn" Crowler whined, obviously trying to wear out the pain.

"If that is all," Dreadroute smirked "Then I summon a second chthonian soldier. As you can see, the first one has received his back-up. Now my element saurus attacks your face-down!"

A second black-armoured soldier appeared with Dreadroute, as the brown dinosaur leapt forwards again, spitting out a fireball, and eliminating the mechanical creature that appeared.

"Fine. Your move. But it won't be long until that moving fortress moves straight in to the graveyard. Then you'll be finished!" laughed Dreadroute evilly

Crowler drew a card. "I activate pot of greed." He yelled, as a familiar green pot appeared alongside him. "And we'll see who laughs last when I draw two cards."

Dreadroute stared at Crowler, open-mouthed. "Did you even think when you said that?" he snarled after a few seconds.

"Fine then, I'll summon my ancient gear soldier in attack position!" Crowler yelled "And then I'll use monster reincarnation!"

First of all, a large warrior made of iron with many gears inside it appeared, and then Crowler's hand and graveyard glowed.

"You see, my monster reincarnation lets me destroy a card in my hand and bring another card back to my hand!" he cried "So I'll toss away block attack to send my mechanical chaser back in to the barracks!"

Placing a card from his hand in to the graveyard, his graveyard shone, and his green android appeared in front of him, disappearing in to his hand.

"Now my ancient gear soldier will eliminate your chthonian soldier!"

Dreadroute laughed. "In all the excitement, it seems that you forgot." He taunted "My soldier will deal 100 to you when you attack as well, putting you even closer to defeat!"

Crowler gasped, but it was too late to call off his attack. The soldier's built-in machine gun rattled, and bullets flew all over the soldier, crushing it, but once again, the sword exploded outwards, dealing Crowler the same damage.

Both life point totals rocketed down, sending Dreadroute's to 2850 and Crowler's to 1825. The crowd was terrified by how close this game was getting, and desperate to see who would win.

"I'll place one card face-down and end my turn." Crowler moaned, once more losing confidence.

"Excellent." Grinned Dreadroute, looking at his next card, his pale face glowing eerily in the light of the volcano. "I equip my nitro unit spell card to your gear soldier, so that when he's destroyed, you take his attack points to your life points, as well as the normal battle damage."

Crowler gasped.

"You see why it's so bad?" Dreadroute continued. "Well my 1900 attack point Vorse raider can smash your soldier, deal 600 damage, and then the rest of your life points drop from the bomb. So I guess this is the end!"

Crowler smiled. "That won't work, I'm afraid! I use mystical space typhoon and destroy your nitro unit before it goes off!"

The bomb appeared wrapped around the soldier, but shattered before it had a chance to tick. The crowd let out a cheer, but something about Dreadroute's sinister grin made them stop expressing their joy.

"Nevertheless, I smash your gear soldier with my Vorse raider."

For a third time, the axe flew forth, this time cutting the soldier in half, only seconds after the bomb vanished, continuing through to Crowler, this time cutting in to his right arm, causing a sudden explosion of blood from beneath.

Crowler's face appeared on the screens again, as his life points dropped yet again, to more outrage from the students. This time they dropped to 1225, and it appeared that he was about to lose.

"Now that I'm finished attacking," Dreadroute laughed "I'll place this nightmare steel cage. It stops any monsters from attacking until the end of your second turn after now."

A large metal cage appeared as he said this, over Dreadroute's monsters. It blocked each set from the other, and took up half the arena. Crowler seemed unfazed by this sudden change of background.

"I'm not worried. That stops your monsters from attacking as well." He smiled "So I'm safe for two turns."

Once more, the crowd yelled out in happiness, to Dreadroute's anger. He was winning though, so he quickly shook it off.

"Your move." He smiled, passing the turn to Crowler

Crowler drew, and leapt up in the air when he saw his card. "Perfect!" he cried, flipping the card to show Dreadroute "My legendary Ancient gear golem. Now I think that I'll summon him with a trick that I picked up from Rory!"

The crowd looked on, confused, as Crowler flipped up his face-down card.

"I use level conversion lab!" he grinned "It let's me summon a high level monster if I roll a 2, 3 or 4 on a dice." Crowler tossed the dice, and it bounced, before landing on a 2.

"Fine work." Admitted Dreadroute "now only if you had that mechanical chaser to back him up."

Crowler flinched, then smiled "But you forgot, I returned him to my hand earlier. I summon back my Mechanical chaser in attack position!"

Dreadroute laughed at his plan's success, as the crowd went in to an uproar. Moments too late, Crowler realised what he had done, and the green robot appeared next to him.

"So, mortal." Dreadroute laughed "You have learnt your lesson. Since your lab only works for a single turn, you need to tribute summon your golem again from next turn."

Crowler frowned, panicking, before settling on a smile again. "That doesn't matter. Your cage will stop you from attacking this turn, and I have two monsters, so next turn I can summon my legendary monster!"

As Crowler exclaimed this, Dreadroute growled, his face full of anger. He drew a card from his deck, and smiled. "I tribute my element saurus to summon the fiend megacyber in attack position!" he grinned "And as you just said, your golem cannot destroy my monster, as the cage is still active for the remainder of your next turn. So I end my turn, and leave it to you."

Dreadroute grinned, as his plan was about to go in to action. All he needed was for Crowler to do the one thing that he knew he would do, and then he could win, and proceed to his next opponent.

"Fine. You're about to see why I have a PhD in duelling. I tribute both of my monsters to summon my legendary monster, Ancient gear golem!"

Crolwer's monsters disappeared, and hundreds of gears appeared in thin air, they started to float, and gather in to one position. After this, bronze armour started coating them, and now, standing opposite Dreadroute and his monsters was a fifteen foot tall robotic monster. It was covered in armour, and its two long arms each ended in a large tool, one was a gun and the other a fist. On top of the robots head was a roman helmet, from which one glowing red eye emerged.

"Now I'll end my turn, and leave my monster to do the rest."

The crowd was cheering so loudly that the sound covered the entire Island, but they began to stop. Something was not right. Most of the duellists there would have been terrified by the 3000 attack point monster ahead of Dreadroute, but he was standing still, smiling. He drew a card, not looking at it, and took a different card, placing it in face-down defence position. All through this he never said a word. Then he opened his mouth, and all that came out was a great burst of diabolical laughter.

After a moment, he spoke in his horrific voice "This is the end. In but a few moments, you will lose everything." He began "I have seen your power, and it is weak. You hide behind your golem, as it is all that you have. That card is the only reason that you have a PhD, and the only reason that you are still alive!"

Crowler remained unshaken "You won't be so happy soon when I wipe out your life points. Did you know my golems ability? Well, when I destroy a defence position card, I deal the difference between my monsters attack and its defence to you! I attack with my gear golem, and destroy your face-down monster! Mechanized melee!"

The golem lumbered forwards, launching its fist out through mid air at the face-down card. As the fist approached, a small man riding a great beast appeared, and smashed. The fist continued to fly through the air, hitting Dreadroute. As the crowd let out another cheer, Dreadroute's life points dropped to 1850.

Sitting with Richard, Bastion around to him. "Crowler actually stands a chance of winning now that he has his golem on the field. I'd say that the chances are 70:30."

"No." Richard stated coolly "Crowler lost before he had begun. Dreadroute wanted him to play his golem, or he would have made sure that Crowler couldn't play it. He must need it on the field to win."

As the pair talked about this, Dead route clambered to his feet, drawing a card. "Let me show you your fate." He muttered, and both he and Crowler's eyes went blank for a moment. After a few seconds, the crowd started muttering to each other, asking what was going on. Roughly a minute after his eyes had gone blank, Crolwer and Dreadroute began to move again, showing that whatever Dreadroute was doing was over.

"No! I don't want to go to that place!" Crolwer screamed, pleading with his opponent, though Dreadroute did not listen.

"Fool, I tribute my vorse raider to summon my summoned skull monster card." Dreadroute began, his brown axe-wielding creature vanishing to be replaced with a tall, bone covered demon. "Next I increase his power by 500 using black pendant!"

A pendant appeared around the creature's neck, and its attack shot up to 3000.

"Now my monster has the same attack as your golem, and he shall attack, destroying them both."

The warrior leapt in to the air, launching out a large ball of lightning at the golem. As it flew through the air, the golem launched its fist, which collided with the energy ball. The two exploded, sending out a shockwave which disintegrated Crowler's golem and Dreadroute's Skull.

Crowler's life points lowered by 500. "What?" he exclaimed "We had the same points. Why did I lose life points?"

"Because, Mr. PhD, My black pendant deals 500 to you upon its destruction. Not that it matters, as I have my fiend megacyber to finish you off."

He gestured, and the golden android standing beside him leapt up, smashing Crowler with its fist. As the creature approached, Crowler screamed.

"No! I don't want to go to that place!"

However, the second the creature hit him and his life points dropped to zero, his eyes went blank and he fell to the floor, motionless. The holograms disappeared, and the Crowd started yelling, but Dreadroute blocked them out. He breathed in, and blew all of his breath out, in a small purple wisp. Damien's body fell to the floor, and the wisp travelled across the arena, seeping in to Crowler's mouth.

Some of the students climbed in to the arena, running to help Crowler, but he stood up, his eyes now glowing red. "He was a fool." He said, but when he spoke, his voice had changed. It was Dreadroute's, but also Damien and Crowler's voices were mixed in.

"Mortals. I have completed my first duel. My second duel shall take place soon, but for now, be gone." As he stated this, a bright light coated the Island, and each of the members of the crowd appeared back where they had been when the duel began.

The only exceptions were Damien, Crowler and Richard. All three were now in the Volcano. Damien was still collapsed, and Richard was now standing opposite Crowler, who had been possessed by Dreadroute.

"You, mortal. You have great power. We shall duel, but not today." Dreadroute grinned, through Crowler's mouth. "Make sure that number four gets to a hospital."

As he said number four, he gestured to Damien, referring to the fact that he was the fourth emissary. Richard stepped forwards, charging at Dreadroute, but a bright light shone ahead of him, and a second later, he was standing on the path to the Obelisk boy's dorm, where he had been an hour before.

Though he did not want to do what Dreadroute wanted, he picked up Damien and took him to the hospital, before running back to work on his deck. He would have to be faster next time.


	12. Resetting the field

Chapter 12

Richard woke from his sleep instantly. He could feel a great power shifting. He knew immediately that it was Dreadroute, and leapt from his bed, grabbing his deck, throwing on clothes and running from the door. He ran out of the Slifer dorm, heading for the Obelisk boys dorm; he had already predicted that Zane would be Dreadroute's next target. He was the best duellist in the school, and Richard knew that half of Zane's deck was made of Dark-type monsters, which seemed to be the focus of Dreadroute's deck.

Richard was not far from the dorm when he saw what he dreaded. Zane was standing outside, and Crowler was hovering opposite him. Dreadroute had adapted Crowler's body a lot since the duel a couple of hours before; he had removed Crowler's ponytail and replaced the Obelisk uniform with a long, daunting, dark cape that flowed to his heels. Richard was about to move, but a duel disk slid along Crowler's arm. It was as black as the cloak, and had numerous plates surrounding the centre where his deck was held for the monsters. Dreadroute slammed his deck in to the disk, and to Richard's despair, a bright light shone over the island once more.

Once more the students found themselves in Dreadroute's flaming arena above the volcano, though this time it appeared that Dreadroute had fitted each side of the arena with twenty chains. Zane was standing beneath a large 'challenger' sign that Dreadroute had produced, whereas the demon himself stood beneath a 'reigning champion' notice.

This time, the crowd were far more inspired, glad to see their best duellist fighting Dreadroute. Zane stood smiling to the crowd's cheers and admiration, as he and Dreadroute activated their duel disks.

"Before we begin," began Dreadroute, his eerie voice mixed in with Crowler's whine "I'll explain the chains behind us. Each time one of us loses 200 life points, a chain behind our opponent snaps. When all twenty chains snap, the duel's winner will plunge in to the lava. This body will be unaffected for now, but if you win, you shall die. Thus, either way you lose your body!"

Zane looked stunned for a moment, and then calmly replied "I do not care. I need to defeat you to save the world, so I will."

"If you're so confident then you can go first." Dreadroute smiled

Numerous people in the crowd looked worried, as it meant that Zane could not summon his Cyber dragon on the first turn, but the duellist smiled and drew cards from his deck.

Zane looked at his cards, smiling. A strategy already formed in his head, but Richard was not sure. In the last duel, Dreadroute had shrugged off Crowler's ancient gear golem, and he knew that this duel wouldn't be much different.

"I'll start by summoning my drillago in attack position, and place two cards face-down." Smiled Zane, as a bizarre machine with a drill for a face and drills for arms appeared alongside him "Now then, show me what you can do."

"Fine then." Dreadroute laughed "I'll start with one of this body's cards, mechanical chaser!"

The green android from Dreadroute's duel against Crowler appeared next to its former enemy, wielding its six tools menacingly.

"Next I'll place two cards face down and attack your drillago." Dreadroute yelled, as the monster flew forward towards Zane's monster. "Since your Drillago has only 1600 points, and my Mechanical chaser has 1850, you lose your monster, and 250 life points!"

Dreadroute was right, and within seconds drillago was gone, and one of the chains behind Dreadroute burst. The crowd was alive with panic and muttering, but Zane smiled and shook off the hit without even blinking.

"Sorry, but I'll activate this! Dust tornado!" yelled Zane, as one of his face-down cards lifted and a great tornado flew from it, smashing one of Dreadroute's newly laid face-down cards. The card that was destroyed showed a lightning bolt striking an android creature. "So sorry, but your divine wrath is destroyed. I saw right through your plan."

Dreadroute laughed eerily. "Fine, I cannot destroy your cyber dragon when you try to special summon it, but remember, I still have a monster, another face-down, and more life points than you. The field belongs to me."

"Not for long!" yelled Zane, drawing a card. "I activate Dark hole. It destroys your mechanical chaser, leaving you defenceless."

As Zane placed the card on his duel disk, a giant black orb appeared, pulling in Dreadroute's mechanical chaser, and leaving a clear space between the two duellists, to much excitement and applause from the crowd.

"Now then, I'll summon a second Drillago to attack you with for 1600 points."

A second robotic, drill-covered creature appeared, and burrowed underground, appearing in front of Dreadroute, and smashing him with its drill-like claws. Dreadroute's life points dropped dramatically to 2400, to uproar of cheers from the crowd, which soon stopped when eight of the twenty chains holding Zane to the platform snapped, and the whole duelling arena shook from the pressure.

"You see, there is no way to win." Mocked Dreadroute "If you beat me, then you die, and if you lose, I get your body. Surrender now and you will not have to suffer any longer."

"Never." Zane smiled, as the crowd cheered again "I shall not allow you to harm anyone else."

Despite Zane's speech, Richard could see that he was bluffing, and the fear was clearly visible in his eyes. Dreadroute laughed evilly, sending chills throughout the entire crowd.

"Well your dark hole was fun, but I'm going to reset the field with an old friend. Give a warm welcome to my second mechanical chaser!"

A second machine appeared alongside Dreadroute, and with only a wave of his hand, the creature flew forwards again, causing the duellists to experience Déjà Vu, and Zane to lose 250 more life points. As the android appeared back with Dreadroute, a second chain behind him broke, and the crowd once more did not know if they should cheer or be distressed. Dreadroute placed another card face-down, and ended his turn.

Zane drew his card, and instantly smiled. "Do you want to know why I'm smiling?" he taunted "I'm smiling because I just drew this, my polymerization spell card!"

Zane lifted a card to the sky, and two of his cyber dragons appeared, one on each side of him. They didn't stay for long however, as they soon combined their tails together to create a larger two headed cyber dragon, its silver plates glowing vibrantly in the volcano's heat.

"My two dragons have combined together to form my 2800 attack point Cyber twin dragon!" Zane roared as the students in the crowd let out a thunderous cheer, knowing that this duel was almost over. "And the best part is that my cyber twin dragon can attack twice in a turn. So when it's finished with your mechanical chaser, it will finish off your life points. Now, my cyber dragon, attack!"

The enormous dragon flew through the air, stopping above Dreadroute's monster and shooting a massive laser at it, and a second at Dreadroute, who continued to smile. As they crashed against the floor, a cloud of smoke surrounded Dreadroute, obscuring him from view.

The crowd cheered, but Zane looked behind himself, stunned, to see that the twelve remaining chains stood unscratched. The crowd began to lose their enthusiasm as the cloud disappeared to reveal Dreadroute standing still, with a large forcefield around him, and a trap card rose beside him. The card shattered, and Dreadroute laughed.

"My waboku trap card negated all battle damage, leaving both my monster and I unscathed." He smirked "But what I'm really interested by is that you were willing to let yourself die."

"If I had not, I would die anyway, and so would everyone else." Zane stated, his eyes filled with rage "Now make your final move."

Dreadroute grinned, raising a card. "If you think that I'll lose next turn, then I'll set one monster in face-down defence position and end my turn."

The crowd started to cheer again, as they already knew about Cyber twin dragon's ability to attack twice, thus destroying both of Dreadroute's monsters.

Zane drew, ignoring the card and turning back to his monster. "My cyber twin dragon will attack both of your monsters! Double strident blast!" yelled Zane, as the mighty dragon once more flew forth, launching a pair of horrific beams at Dreadroute's two creatures. The first beam struck its target perfectly, destroying Dreadroute's mechanical chaser and lowering him to 1450 life points.

Once more, the crowd rejoiced, though their happiness was once again short lived, as the platform shook and four more of Zane's chains snapped, making the ledge tilt backwards slightly.

The second beam flew at Dreadroute's face-down, but when the card flipped, it revealed a small, mechanical jar hovering in the air, which exploded before the beam hit it, sending shockwaves outwards.

Dreadroute let out another burst of unearthly laughter. "My cyber jar destroys every monster on the field when it is flipped, so say goodbye to your Cyber twin dragon!"

The audience and Zane let out a cry, but it was too late, and the enormous dragon shattered in to pieces.

"Next up, we each draw 5 cards, and summon any level four or lower monsters among them." Dreadroute continued.

Zane picked up the top five cards of his deck. "Ok then, I summon my Reflect bounder and my nanobreaker in face-up attack position!"

Dreadroute smiled, lifting five cards of his own, and placing two of them face down. "That is all." He said, in his ghostly tone.

"Fine then. Since it is still my battle phase, I'll have each of my monsters attack one of yours." Zane responded, as the large red, mirror-covered robot leapt at one of Dreadroute's face-down cards, destroying it instantly. Then, his armour-covered Nanobreaker monster flew at the next card.

It flipped up, to reveal a small goblin holding a spear, though it was instantly destroyed by the nanobreaker's huge sword.

"You just activated the effect of my spear cretin." Smiled Dreadroute "It allows us each to resurrect one of our monsters to our field. So I can once again reset this game."

"Fine with me, I'll bring back my cyber twin dragon!" yelled Zane, once more prompting a great cheer from the crowd, who knew that cyber twin dragon's effect could take out the monster that Dreadroute summoned, and then win the game. The people closest to Zane in the crowd started trying to reach out so that they could save him when he fell.

"I'll choose this card, and play it in face-down defence position." Smiled Dreadroute, once more eerily acting as if he had the upper hand.

"Well." Began Zane, smiling again "It's still my battle phase, and since my cyber twin dragon entered the graveyard, it can attack twice more!"

The creature hovered forwards again, launching out a large beam. The beam flew at Dreadroute's monster, but when the card lifted, the crowd burst in to terror. Once again floating above Dreadroute's field was the cyber jar, and once again every monster on the field was destroyed.

The crowd was in despair, trying to calculate the possibility of Zane returning his cyber twin dragon again. Zane scowled, and lifted five cards. "I'll play my light hex sealed fusion in attack position this time!"

Dreadroute smiled. "Looks like this reset is successful. I summon my vorse raider, memory crusher and Double coston in attack position. And since you have no monsters that are stronger than mine, I'd say that your enormous battle phase is finally over."

Zane smiled. "My battle phase may be over, but I still haven't summoned this turn, so I'll tribute my hex sealed fusion to summon Jinzo!" The crowd once more responded with excited cheers, as the large, green armoured android appeared in front of Zane, boasting its 2400 attack points at Dreadroute's three weaker creatures.

"Since I already ended my battle phase, however, I can't attack and I have to end it there."

Dreadroute grinned, allowing Crowler's face to fill with evil. "You cannot recover from my resetting techniques, Zane. You're about to lose this match, and your body!"

"Take a look around, Dreadroute." Zane smirked "I have a monster stronger than any of your monsters, and I still have 3500 life points, whereas you have only got 1450 left. This duel is going to be over soon, but you're the one who will lose."

The crowd cheered at Zane's dramatic speech, but Dreadroute lifted a card and interrupted. "This card will change everything!" he grinned. "My black pendant increases Vorse raider's attack by 500, giving him enough to take out your Jinzo!"

Zane laughed "Sorry, but that won't work. I activate my face-down card, mystical space typhoon. I predicted this from the start of the game, and now you'll lose!"

A hurricane burst from Zane's card, shattering the black pendant that was gliding towards vorse raider's head. Suddenly, the arena shook as Dreadroute lost three more of the chains behind him, and Zane's life points fell to 3000.

"I forgot to mention." Dreadroute smiled "My black pendant deals 500 damage to you when it's destroyed."

"It doesn't matter" Zane beamed "You've already fallen in to my trap, and the game is won!"

"Actually," Dreadroute interrupted "You fell in to my trap. I activate my face-down card, shrink. And since you just used you mystical space typhoon, you have no more defence. My shrink card splits your Jinzo's attack points in half, so now he only has 1200 points, and my vorse raider and double coston can each defeat it."

Zane frowned, but it was too late. All three of Dreadroute's monsters had already leapt in to the air, and his Jinzo was destroyed only moments after it shrunk, leaving Zane open for the other two attacks. His life points hit zero, and one by one, the chains behind Dreadroute snapped.

"I knew you didn't have the guts to kill yourself." Laughed Dreadroute as the chains exploded "but as promised, I shall let this mortal survive."

Dreadroute flew in to the air, as the last of the chains smashed, and tossed himself backwards, letting his spirit fly out, so that Crowler's limp body crashed in to the crowd.

The arena tilted, falling to nearly a 90 degree angle, so that Zane had to cling on so that he did not fall.

"I shall let you be free." Smiled Dreadroute, though it was unknown what mouth he spoke from, as he now hovered as a dark cloud of black mist above the field. "Surrender yourself to me, and let your body be mine!" he roared, flying down to Zane and crashing in to his mouth.

However, seconds before Dreadroute entered, Zane let go, allowing himself to tumble in to the lava, sending Dreadroute with him. The crowd sat silently for a moment, peering in to the lava, as it bubbled quietly.

After a minute, the lava burst open, and Zane hovered out of the lava, though he was clearly no longer Zane. He was now wearing a long dark cape, and black clothing, and his face was scarred and red from the flaming lava. The most dramatic change was his voice, which, whilst still containing essences of his original voice, now had Crowler's whine and Dreadroute's hideous taunting tone mixed in.

He looked around the crowd, laughing evilly, but not saying anything. He stopped laughing suddenly serious, said "23 hours", snapped his fingers, and suddenly everyone disappeared in a flash of light.

Richard was back in his room, looking down at the four decks in front of him. He now knew that he stood no chance against Dreadroute. The best student in the school could not defeat him, and he now knew that no-one could. The world was destined to be destroyed.

Suddenly, he felt a cool breeze behind him and heard the haunting voice of Dark Dreadroute once again, shocked when Zane's voice was combined with it. "You shall be the final one. Don't worry, I can promise you that you won't be late next time."

Richard spun around, but there was no-one there, and all he could now hear was Dreadroute's haunting laughter echoing through his head. He frowned, and went straight to his desk, rummaging through the cards to find a deck suitable to fight the hideous creature he had just seen battle. If Dreadroute continued his pattern, it would only be a matter of hours, and the fate of the universe would be in his hands.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the island, in the medical room, Rory was fast asleep, in a deep state of unconsciousness. His heart beat was slowly dwindling.

A boy, shorter than the one lying down, stepped silently in to the room, as if from nowhere. He had never visited the island before, and he wasn't going to stay long. He stepped over to Rory's bed, and placed his pale hand upon Rory's chest. The brown hair on the boy's head lifted up, floating as his power was delivered to Rory.

Rory's heart was still growing weaker however, and the boy frowned, though he was not going to give up yet.

"Help me my friend." He said, lifting a card in to the air. A large dragon emitted itself from the card, appearing in the room, covered in gears and cogs. It breathed a white wisp out to the boy, before disappearing back in to the card. "Thank you." Said the boy, returning the card to his deck as Rory's heart began to beat again, thanks to the tiny part of that boy's spirit that was now inside of him.

"You can defeat Dreadroute just like I have done." The boy smiled, stepping away from Rory and leaving the door, and the island with it. Minutes later, Rory's eyes opened for half a second before he fell back in to nothingness. Then they opened again, and he rose from his bed, his face, glowing with light as it returned to its original features, dropping the grim hanging flesh that had been placed their by Bone.

Instantly he could sense the presence of Dreadroute. And he gave himself the duty of putting it to an end.


	13. Dark Vs Light

Chapter 13

There was not long left. Richard had to hurry to prepare his deck for hid upcoming match against Dreadroute. He was still missing a card however. He didn't know what card, but it needed to finish off Dreadroute's deck. From what he had seen from the previous two duels, there were only three cards in the world that could defeat his deck; Slifer the sky dragon, Obelisk the tormentor and the winged dragon of Ra. Since these cards were long gone, Richard had no hope of defeating Dreadroute, unless he found a more powerful card.

Suddenly, the lights in the room flickered, and burst in to nothingness. A chill breeze picked up in the room, and a green glow lit the room. Richard stood to his feet, and looked around, already knowing what was coming next. The room shook, and a bright light exploded from its centre, as a familiar figure appeared before Richard.

Standing in front of Richard was the boy who he had once admired as the best duellist in the school, but he was no longer that boy. He had been taken by a dark force that now lived only to consume and destroy. That force was the demon Dark Dreadroute.

"You have been chosen, Richard Capricorn!" Dreadroute said coldly, his eerie voice combined with the voices of his previous victims, Crowler and Zane. "You shall be my final opponent. Then I shall rise once more to power, and no-one can stop me in my quest to eliminate the universes that surround us!"

"Fine then, I accept." Richard scowled "And you're right, this shall be your final duel, because I'm going to destroy you now! Prepare to be wiped from existence for all time!"

Richard's duel disk flew to his arm, already active. His deck materialised within the holder, and Dreadroute smiled. It was all about to be over. But what neither duellist realised was that there was going to be a complication in Dreadroute's plan.

The white light once more encompassed the island, and the students prepared for what they knew would be Dreadroute's last duel. As they appeared in their stands they all muttered between themselves. They didn't know why Richard had been chosen. He had been able to save Slifer dorm, but would he be able to defeat this demon that not even Zane had been able to defeat, and save the universe?

Richard frowned at their unease. With them against him, he certainly wouldn't win; he had not had time to prepare his deck enough, and there was no way that his current deck would be enough to win.

"We shall duel with 4000 life points," began Dreadroute "And let the endgame begin!"

"Stop!" yelled a voice from the other side of the crowd. All of the students turned towards the figure, who had a duel disk at his side and silhouetted himself against the white glow behind him. Even Dreadroute stared madly to see who it was. Richard felt a refreshing power run through him, and instantly knew who it was.

Rory walked down through the crowd, approaching the arena. His duel disk was poised, and the dead skin hanging to his face was barely remaining. For a moment, the crowd was stunned, but they soon lost hope, as Rory had lost to Richard, and definitely wouldn't be able to win.

"Dark Dreadroute!" he yelled "I call upon the power of the hailed one!" When Rory said this, Dreadroute screamed and his skin began to burn.

His eyes were now bright yellow when he rose, and shadows were rising beneath his skin.

"By the power of the hailed one, I command this duel shall cease!" Rory yelled, running towards the arena.

"You cannot! My arena is shielded; you shall never pierce the barrier!" Dreadroute yelled, though it seemed to Richard like it was wishful thinking.

Rory leapt in to the air, and a great energy stirred in the air as he hit the barrier. He was held in mid-air for a second, before the barrier exploded and he landed on the arena alongside Richard. He nodded silently to Richard, who dropped his duel disk to his side.

Dreadroute ran towards him to stop him from leaving, but a force blasted him down to the floor. He let out a scream of agony, before climbing to his feet, breathing heavily. "Fine. You are no hailed one! I accept your challenge." He screamed "In fact, you are the one that Cavourre prepared for me. You shall be my next victim, and then I shall return to finish off you, Richard."

Dreadroute reactivated his duel disk, and Rory activated his. "I read up on you, Dreadroute." Smiled Rory "I learnt about how you duelled the hailed one in every universe that there ever was, and then he defeated you with his three legendary monsters. They imprisoned you inside a dark dimension where you could never escape, unless a massive amount of duel energy was sacrificed. They also imprisoned you inside a duel card, and only with that card could you be released."

"Very good knowledge! But that will not assist you; look at what I have here!" as Dreadroute replied, he held out a card from his deck, with a picture of a great demon on it; the same demon that Rory had seen drawn on a card in Ted's room what seemed like millenniums ago. And the same demon that was now standing in front of him.

"That won't help; I'll destroy you AND that card!" smirked Rory "Now let's duel!"

Dreadroute frowned, activating his duel disk, shuffling his cards again and drawing five new ones. Rory also drew five cards, and smiled sinisterly. "You play first."

Dreadroute grabbed the top card from his deck, and whisked it past his face. "I summon my vorse raider in attack position and end my turn." He grinned "There is a rumour that you also play a dark deck, so let's see whose is the greatest!"

"Fine." Rory laughed "It's time to see your own strategies thrown against you! And I'll start with this!"

Rory slammed a card down on to the disk, and the crowd gasped in shock. On Dreadroute's side of the field was his large, beast-like vorse raider, and newly appearing on Rory's field was his own monstrous vorse raider.

"I summon my own vorse raider!" Rory grinned "So let's see if good or evil is stronger. Vorse Raider, attack!"

Dreadroute looked confused, but beckoned for his monster to meet Rory's. Richard caught Rory's gaze, and they both smiled. Just as the monsters were about to collide, Rory whipped a card from his hand.

"I activate my shrink spell card! It halves your monster's attack, and means that I will win the combat."

Rory initially laughed, but soon realised that Dreadroute was also holding up a spell card. "Snap." He grinned "I also activate shrink!"

In mid-air, both monsters shrank to half their sizes, and collided, both exploding. The crowd looked worried, but Rory kept calm. "Your move."

"Good. I summon Drillago in attack position." Dreadroute chuckled "I took this card from the previous owner of this body, and now it shall claim me a new body!"

The drill-faced creature that Zane had used in his duel appeared before Dreadroute, and leapt at Rory, drilling in to his arm. Blood spouted out and he let out a scream. As the machine returned to Dreadroute, Rory's life points dropped to 2400, and the crowd began to mutter and moan.

"Now I set one card face-down and end the turn." Dreadroute smiled, his three voices combining evilly.

"Fine then." Rory frowned, holding his arm. "Your about to see what makes my deck so powerful! It isn't just darkness like yours; it also contains the power of light, and the power to destroy darkness. Now I summon my disciple of the forbidden spell!"

A tall robed man appeared alongside Rory, and drew a blade from his waist. "Now my Disciple of the forbidden spell, destroy his drillago!"

The man jumped in to the air, and was about to drop his sword on Dreadroute, when he flipped his face-down card. "I activate my face-down card, negate attack, which forces your attack to end, and sets the game for your loss."

Rory glared at Dreadroute, and placed a card face-down. "I end my turn."

Dreadroute laughed. "Now do you see why you are going to lose? The power of light is insignificant compared to the might of darkness, you shall never defeat my hordes, and you shall never save the world. By choosing your light cards, you chose to lose this duel, and your body!"

"No!" yelled Richard "You're wrong! Because he chose his light cards, he chose to win this match and eliminate you, and I know that he will! Ror has the power to defeat you and save the world!"

"Do you really think that? Look at these people; they are not inspired, they do not think that he shall win. They've lost all hope. They have accepted their destinies. Accept yours!" Dreadroute shouted "My drillago's effect allows it to attack your life points directly!"

The monster jumped in to the air, though the crowd were not surprised, they were already dismal and depressed. It burrowed in to the earth, but before it surfaced, Dreadroute activated a card in his hand.

"I activate my limiter removal, which doubles my monster's attack to 3200 and wins me the duel!"

Rory smiled and flipped his face-down card face-up. "Sorry, Dready. Today light wins! I activate my draining shield! It stops your attack and turns it to light, healing me by 3200!"

The drillago burst in to the air, but all of its power drained from it, focusing around Rory, and repairing his skin, covering his wound. As Dreadroute despaired, Rory's life points rose to 5600, and the people around him began chanting.

"Rory! Rory!" droned the crowd, as Dreadroute stared around furiously

"You can't do this! You can't beat me! I am Dark Dreadroute; you can't be winning! I shall annihilate you!"

"But you're forgetting something!" Rory smiled "At the end of the turn, your monster is destroyed leaving you wide open to my disciple's attack! This game is over, and the power of light is victorious!"

Dreadroute let out a scream, and the volcano echoed him with a titanic eruption, launching fire around the outside of the arena, and dropping boulders in to the crowd. The students started to get up and run, avoiding the falling debris and crashing waves of fire. The lava dropped down above Dreadroute, Rory and Richard, but stopped in mid-air as if held away by a force-field, though blocking the crowd from view, and trapping Richard and Rory in with Dreadroute.

"You shall be destroyed!" Dreadroute screamed, his eyes now bright red entirely. "The power of Dark Dreadroute is limitless; you have no way to stand against it! How do you persist to evade destruction! My new empire shall rise today, and you shall burn in eternity for your efforts against me! Not even the hailed one shall stand against me!"

"Today, the hailed one fights through me, as he has chosen that I shall eliminate you! Dreadroute, you shall be once more imprisoned in the edge of time and space, never to surface!"

Rory glowed as he said this, and a ghost like creature stepped from him. It was a boy only slightly shorter than him. His brown hair was pale in his spiritual form, but still blended in with his tanned skin.

"It has been a long time." He muttered to the demon opposite him. "Millennia even. I see that you have planned it all out, but through this boy I shall fight you. I have entrusted him with the power of my monsters, and they shall assist his spirit to destroy you forever."

Richard and Rory exchanged a puzzled look, as Dreadroute talked to thin air, and had no response, though answered as if given one. Suddenly, he let out a shriek and refocused himself.

"The hailed one shall not defy me! I shall destroy you despite his power!"

"Gone off the deep end, Dready?" Rory taunted "Maybe you should quit now and go back to your prison for a few more millenniums. That would be nice."

"You shall burn for your incompetence." The demon yelled. When he replied, all traces of Zane and Crowler's voices were gone, and al that was left was his eerie, sinister, dark undertone that chilled Rory and Richard's spines.

"Well, Dready." Rory eventually replied "If you're so sure that you want to be destroyed, let's continue our duel!"

As the two duellists once more returned their attention to the duel, lava burst up outside their dome of fire, crashing in to the crowd. Rory had to win the duel fast if he was going to save the hundreds of duellists in the crowd, but more importantly, he had to save the world!


	14. Rory's Final Strike

Chapter 14

_LAST TIME… Dreadroute was summoned by Damien, whose body was later possessed by him. Dreadroute then went on to possess the bodies of Crowler and Zane, after defeating them in duels. He proceeded to challenge Richard, but Rory was awoken from his coma by a mysterious person, and forced Dreadroute to duel him instead. Though the duel started badly, Rory quickly managed to gain the advantage._

As the students ran around the stands which Dreadroute had made within the vicinity of the volcano, dodging the lava that was bursting madly from the crater below, they wondered what was happening beneath the orb of fire within which Dreadroute and Rory were duelling.

Inside the orb, Dreadroute slammed a card down on his duel disk. "Since I did not summon earlier this turn, I summon Opticlops in attack position, and since it has more attack than your disciple of the forbidden spell, which only has 1700 points, you won't be able to attack! Now I end my turn."

As Dreadroute ended his turn, the drill-faced creature beside him exploded in to dust. "Sorry, but it looks like your drillago removed more than just it's limit!" Rory smirked, drawing a card from his deck. "Now I'll activate a card which proves that light is stronger, my luminous spark field spell card!"

As Rory boomed this, the whole field lit up with a blinding light, forcing Dreadroute and Opticlops to cower and shield their eyes, though Rory did not even blink. "My luminous spark spell card increases every light monster's attack by 500 points. That means that my Disciple can now destroy your opticlops!"

The warrior standing with Rory leapt up in to the air and pulled back its shimmering blade, slamming it down on Opticlops, and tearing it in half. A burst of light shot from the sword as it did this, and all of the duellists outside the lava dome stopped to look at the arena glow from beneath the lava. They did not know what was happening, but it seemed positive, though they did not have time to cheer, as they were still under threat from the erupting volcano.

Dreadroute fell to the ground as his monster shattered, and his life points fell to 3600. When he stood, his skin was burnt from the powerful light which had just hit him. Rory beckoned to him to make his move.

Dreadroute smiled. "I activate Dian Keto the cure master to bring my life points back to 4600!" he muttered, as he shone and the burns vanished. "And then I place one card face-down, ending my turn."

"You're just going to leave yourself open to a direct attack?" Rory yelled, stunned "I thought better than you. Oh well, I summon my shining abyss in attack position, and both my monsters will show you the power of light!"

As Rory said this, a large blue and gold statue appeared next to him, as its attack increased to 2100, and the two creatures flew towards Dreadroute. They each launched a beam of light, and the two beams completely covered Dreadroute's side of the field, blocking him from view completely.

Outside of the dome, the duellists look on in wonder as Dreadroute's field lit up, covering one side of the lava dome in a bright light. The duellists then leapt out of the way, just in time to avoid the lava that crashed against the seats where they had just been standing. Now that the lava was gone, they could see Dreadroute standing still, burnt from head to toe. His clothes were torn, and one of his eyes was cut directly down the middle. His life point counter was on 300, and he had a card raised face-up beside him.

"I activate my damage condenser trap card!" he panted, his eerie voice barely reaching the crowd's ears. "It allows me to take that damage and form a new monster; I can add a card in my deck to the field without paying tributes, so long as it's attack is lower than the damage dealt. Since you just dealt 4300 points of damage, I can summon any monster in my deck. So I summon my Dark ruler Vandalgyon!"

The whole arena shook as Dreadroute activated his card. A burst of lava erupted from the centre of the arena, smashing up through the middle of the stadium. The solid column of lava eventually dispersed, leaving behind a large purple warrior wearing a vast cloak and wielding an enormous blade.

"Wait a minute," Rory puzzled "If you could summon any monster in your deck, then why didn't you summon yourself?"

"Didn't it already occur to you? Dark Dreadroute is already within my hand!" the fiend roared, as his enormous behemoth hovered above him. "And to make matters worse for you, your luminous spark is about to be destroyed. I activate my mystic plasma zone!"

The blinding light faded, and a great purple beam blasted from the massive hole in the centre of the arena. It converged in to a cloud that circled just below Vandalgyon, blocking him from view.

"My mystic plasma zone has the same effect as your spark, but instead it works for dark monsters. This means that my Vandalgyon's attack increases from 2800 to 3300, and makes him one of the most powerful cards in existence! Now I summon my dark jeroid in attack position."

A small four-legged creature appeared next to Dreadroute, below the cloud of dark energy. It launched out a black orb, which shocked Rory's Shining abyss, which had recently returned to 1600 attack points, though it now shot down even further, until it only had 800 points remaining.

"My jeroid not only has 1200 points, which become 1700 because of my plasma zone, but it also deducts 800 points from your monster! Now It can attack and destroy it!"

The small creature bound forwards, kicking Rory's shining abyss and shattering it. Rory felt the shards hit him like daggers, as his life points fell to 4700.

"But that is not all; next Vandalgyon shall attack you! Now my mighty monster, destroy this pest!"

The whole of the volcano shook as Vandalgyon burst downwards through the cloud, slicing Rory's disciple in half with only a flick of his blade, and sending a great wave of energy crashing in to Rory, who flew backwards towards the lava, though he managed to dig in his feet and remain standing.

After Vandalgyon returned to his cloud, Dreadroute placed two cards face down on the field and ended his turn. Rory flinched, as his life points fell to 3100 and blood trickled from beneath his ear. He felt like he was about to explode, but he could sense a great force within himself, like it was his duty to continue, and that he had to destroy Dreadroute. He turned back to his enemy and drew a card, conscious of the mighty monster lying in the cloud above him.

He looked at his cards, and smiled. "Fine then, Dready, I admit. Darkness is powerful, but so is light, so I don't know what to choose. How about I combine them both in to the ultimate beast?

"That is not possible!" Dreadroute yelled in surprise.

"Oh yes it is. I combine the Disciple of the forbidden spell and the vorse raider in my graveyard to create the almighty powerful Chaos Emperor Dragon – Envoy Of The End!"

Once again, Rory's ultimate monster descended from the sky. It glided slowly downwards through Vandalgyon's smog, and as it slowly reached Rory's field, its wings glimmered bright blue under the purple cloud above it, and a tremendous force circled it. Dreadroute looked on in horror as the monster's attack increased to 3500 points.

Dreadroute snarled. "You have turned my own plasma zone against me now, giving your dragon more power and making him stronger than vandalgyon!" He yelled "But it shall soon become my dragon when I harvest your deck and body upon your defeat."

Rory gulped, and suddenly recalled the way that Bone had been speaking in his duel against him; just like Dreadroute was now, as if he was some inanimate object. The thought made him shudder, but he shook it off and pointed at Dreadroute's cloud.

"My Dragon, I call upon your special power!" Rory yelled, as his dragon glowed eerily under the purple cloud, and drew back its head to blast its fire. Rory caught an echo of a smile on Dreadroute's sinister lips, and suddenly remembered his duel against Damien, which seemed so long ago now.

When he had summoned his dragon that time, he had used his monster's effect, but it backfired, defeating him instead. As he thought this, his eyes flickered over the two face-down cards on the opposite side of the field, and noted Dreadroute lifting his hand towards his cards.

"Stop! I do not activate my dragon's effect!" Rory roared, just before his monster fired. "Chaos Emperor dragon – Envoy Of The End, destroy Dreadroute's Vandalgyon now, and lower him to the last of his lie points!"

"Well done, Rory, you identified my face down divine wrath, but you are still missing the power of Dreadroute. I could destroy you whether you used your effect or not!"

Rory gasped as his monster flew upwards in to Vandalgyon's cloud, and he turned to Dreadroute's cards, but it was already too late, as his second face-down card rose to eye level.

"I activate my magical cylinders, and reflect your dragon's attack back at your life points!"

Rory was stunned, and barely noticed as his monster flew back from Dreadroute's cloud, and blasted a great beam of energy at him. As the beam hit him, he screamed, and flew in to the air, tumbling towards the lava circling the arena.

As he fell, Richard ran out to the edge of the arena and grabbed Rory's hand, only just saving him from plummeting to his death. After a moment of just holding on, Richard managed to lift Rory back on to the arena.

"That was a close one, Ror." Richard muttered to his friend. "Now let's destroy this creep!"

Rory nodded, and turned back to his enemy, as Chaos emperor dragon returned to his field, and his life points dropped to 100.

"It's do or die time, Dreadroute!" he smirked, wiping blood from his chin. "If you summon a strong enough monster to take out my dragon, you'll win, but if you can't, I'll finish you next turn!"

"But you fool," Dreadroute laughed, drawing a card "You already know I have a powerful enough monster to destroy your dragon, and your soul, I activate monster reborn to bring back my Vorse raider, giving me a total of 3 monsters!"

"So what if you have 3 monsters; none are strong enough to defeat my Chaos Emperor Dragon!" Rory smiled, though he realised what was coming, and went pale with fear.

Vandalgyon lowered down from his cloud, kneeling alongside Dreadroute's jeroid and raider, which both also kneeled. "Now is the dawn of a new era!" boomed Dreadroute, as the whole island trembled, and the volcano let out a tremendous burst of lava.

The billowing smog above the duellists parted, circling downwards in to the volcano, and destroying all three of Dreadroute's monsters, as he lifted a card from his hand, and a great shadow appeared in the sky, silhouetting a giant beast.

Zane's body went limp and collapsed to the ground, as the creature let out a devastating roar that blew away trees from their roots further down the island. The creature slowly began to descend, until Rory could just about see the tips of its enormous, demonic claws.

Rory did not have to guess what was about to happen, so he opened his arms out wide to let the blast cover him. The sky lit with an enormous purple glow, and a column of light twenty metres wide encompassed Rory's body.

The crowd was silent, only allowing the noise of Rory's screams to pierce the droning of the laser. As the monster and the laser vanished, Richard ran over to Rory who was lying motionless on the ground.

As he looked over him, he saw him stir, and smiled, though when Rory opened his eyes, his smile dropped. Rory stood, and let out a villainous laugh, Dreadroute's voice now mixed with his, Zane's and Crowler's. A burst of energy emitted from his palms, and the whole crowd was instantly warped back to their rooms, thankful; that they no longer had to stand in the erupting volcano.

Richard sat in his room, not moving, just staring at the decks in front of him. Now he was determined to defeat Dreadroute. He would reclaim Rory's body, he would destroy Dreadroute, and he would save the world!


	15. Master and Servant

Chapter 15

Richard placed a fortieth card on the pile. The deck was now finished, and he had tested it. It would be able to defeat Dreadroute's deck. However, he still had been unable to find a card to destroy Dreadroute himself, which Richard was sure he would be able to summon. If it could reach the field, then Richard would be destroyed along with the universe.

Suddenly, he heard a knock at the door, and slammed the deck in to his duel disk, until he realised that Dreadroute wouldn't knock, and opened the door. On the other side was Damien, who appeared to have recovered in the hospital wing. Richard swung his fist at Damien, hitting him in the face with his duel disk, and knocking him to the floor.

"Stop!" cried Damien, reaching out to his face, which had lit with a large black bruise. "I am here because I want to help you!"

"You? Help me?" Richard snorted "You're the one who summoned Dreadroute in the first place!"

"No, it wasn't me!" Damien stated, standing up "I was possessed by Dreadroute at the time, and he made me summon him."

Richard glared, rejecting this idea. However, Damien did seem to be lacking the arrogance that he usually had, so Richard stopped glaring. "Go on."

"I want to make up for releasing him, so I created a card that could use Dreadroute's power against him, and destroy his spirit forever. This is what I came up with." Damien said, handing Richard a card.

The card was bright purple, the sign of a fusion monster. A large blue shimmering knight centred the card, and it boasted 3300 attack points. Shining valiantly from the top of the card were the words 'Chaos Emperor Knight'.

"Wait, I can't use this card; I don't have chaos emperor dragon to use as a fusion material!" Richard complained.

"Well, you're going to need to capture it during the match, and fuse it with your Gaia the fierce knight. You see, we have to use Rory's body to reject Dreadroute and destroy it." Damien explained "The hailed one who destroyed Dreadroute millenniums ago put the power of his monsters in to Rory so that he could fight back, and this is the key to unlocking that power."

As Richard took the card, a great purple light lit the room, and the roof exploded. Far above the two boys was a third boy, whose black hair had burst out of shape, launching in every direction, matching the insane character of the demon within the body.

"Richard Capricorn, you shall be my final opponent!" Dreadroute roared "Prepare to be eliminated!"

"No!" Interrupted Damien "I shall duel you next! I have a score to settle for when you stole my body!"

"It was a necessity. Now I shall duel you, and prove that I cannot be beaten."

"What are you doing?" Richard asked Damien

"You need to find out what Dreadroute's new deck is like; he won't use my cards because they're all water type. This is your chance to find out what he is using after he defeated Rory!"

Richard nodded and stepped back, as Dreadroute growled, angry that once more he had been conned out of a battle with Richard, ands thus his freedom. After a moment, he shrugged, and his duel disk shone down his arm, glowing in the darkness. Simultaneously, Damien knocked his duel disk out and smiled evilly.

The white glow once more covered the island, this time transporting the duellists to the beach, and to a new coliseum that had been built there. Since the destruction of the volcano arena during the fight with Rory, Dreadroute had had to build a second war zone.

Damien and his demonic opponent were each standing perched on great rocks emerging from the crashing water, and the students were sitting on a massive stand on the beach, where Rory and Jaden had duelled only days before, though it felt like an eternity.

In between the pillars of rock, there was a flat slab of stone which Richard was chained to. As the crowd looked on surprised, a few cheered that Damien was duelling, not knowing that he was the one who had released him.

"Confused? You see, Damien, each time you summon one of your water monsters, the water level will raise, until Richard is trapped below, and the tide rips him apart."

"Well then, too bad for you; I only need to use three monsters to win this duel." Damien laughed, as the crowd and Dreadroute all looked shocked, and the crowd burst in to a mighty cheer. "I brought you here Dreadroute, now I'll wipe you from this globe forever."

Rory's eyes glowed red as Dreadroute filled with anger. "Show me then! Let's duel!"

"Please, Dreadroute, you go first." Damien mocked, to further cheering from the crowd.

Both duellists drew 5 cards, and Dreadroute drew another. "I summon my vorse raider in attack position and place one card face down." Dreadroute muttered, flinching as the crowd cheered his former servant's name.

"Time for teacher to surpass master, Dreadroute." Damien grinned "I activate snatch steal, to bring vorse raider to my field."

A giant hand emerged from Damien's pillar and grabbed his vorse raider, placing it on Damien's field.

"Oh well, I gain 1000 points each turn now." Dreadroute smiled

"Unless, of course, I tribute vorse raider to summon my mobius the frost monarch, and destroy your face down negate attack!"

Dreadroute's eyes flew wide open, as his vorse raider and face down card exploded, and a large white armoured soldier appeared beside Damien's pillar. "How did you know my face down card?" Dreadroute screamed in bemusement "Nevertheless, my trap is already setting in!"

At first, the crowd was confused by Dreadroute's statement, until they noticed the water rise to Richard's waist, and proceed to the bottom of the stands.

Damien laughed. "I'm not done yet. Now that I have destroyed your negate attack, I think I'll bring out my next creature. I activate my Big wave small wave!"

Remembering the card from his duel against Damien, Richard smiled, but as the enormous tidal wave crashed past, covering the entire field, he panicked, barely able to hold his breath for the duration of the attack.

Unfortunately, when the wave did pass, the water was still at his shoulders. Dreadroute shook the water from his skin, eyeing down the large blue serpent that had replaced Damien's monarch.

"Say hello to my Levia Dragon – Daedalus!" Damien laughed "But don't get too well acquainted; I tribute him to special summon my third monster; Ocean Dragon Lord – Neo Daedalus!"

The water started to rise to Richard's face, but it all burst skywards instead, forming a giant column of water, which dropped to reveal Damien's ultimate monster, with an uproar of excited screams from the crowd.

The water rose to Richard's face, forcing him to press on to his toes to stop the water from covering his mouth and nose. "Are you okay down there, Richard?" Damien asked

Richard nodded, and Damien grinned, turning back to Dreadroute, who was now soaking. "That's good, because this is the last monster I need to destroy you! I use a legendary ocean!"

As Damien slammed the card in to his field spell slot, great palaces and sunken ships rose from the water, surrounding the two stone pillars and the platform below, on which Richard was standing.

"Now then, my Dragon Lord gains 200 attack points due to my field spell, giving him a grand total of 3100 attack points, and since you have no more monsters, I can attack you directly!"

The crowd cheered so loudly that Dreadroute nearly collapsed from his pillar. Suddenly, Damien's dragon glowed.

"Next, I'll call upon the power of the hailed one who originally banished you to make my Daedalus unstoppable! Now then, Daedalus destroyer!"

A colossal beam of mystical energy flew from the mouths of Damien's mighty serpent, and hit Dreadroute, blasting his arms backwards and knocking him from the pillar.

His life point counter hit 900, but he was nowhere to be seen. After a moment, he surfaced beyond his pillar, his face paler than ever, showing the hundreds of veins beneath it. He floated towards the arena, emerging from the water and landing on his pillar.

"You shall not end me, Cavourre. I am the ultimate force that ever existed, and you shall be reduced to nothing!"

"Then why don't you show me what you've got?"

"Fine. I set one monster in face-down defence position, and set two cards face down. You shall be destroyed by the end of my next turn, and I shall duel Richard for his soul. His soul and my freedom." As Dreadroute said this final sentence, his eerie voices converged and everyone in the crowd froze with fear.

Damien laughed. "Nice try, but you're bluffing. My monster will dispose of you this turn. You see, my 'a legendary ocean' card counts as being called umi. And since my Daedalus can destroy every last one of your cards by destroying my umi card, I can activate the effect and finish this duel!"

"Stop right there!" Dreadroute interrupted as the crowd cheered. "I activate my solemn judgement. By paying half of my life points, it allows me to stop your effect. And in turn, that allows me to special summon my Dark Ruler Vandalgyon from my hand, and then he allows me to summon vorse raider from my graveyard."

Dreadroute let out a villainous burst of laughter as his life points dropped to 450. The enormous cloaked warrior from his duel against Rory appeared above him, as well as the axe-swinging beast-warrior that Damien had stolen only turns ago.

"Sorry, Dreadroute, but you seem to have forgotten my attack! I call upon the power of the hailed one, and now Daedalus shall pierce through your vorse raider and destroy you!"

As the serpent reared back its head to unleash another devastating wave of fury, Dreadroute smiled and lifted a card on his duel disk. "I activate my Draining shield!" he smirked "It allows me to stop your attack and heal my life points by the attack of your dragon lord to 3550!"

Damien gasped but quickly shook himself to. "Fine. That gives you an extra turn, but next turn I can finish you, and you have no way of stopping me!"

Damien burst into a maniacal cloud of laughter, as the crowd behind him cheered, and Richard attempted to smile whilst staying on top of the water.

"Well then," Dreadroute began, drawing a card "It's time to bring back my Vandalgyon's cloud again; I activate Mystic Plasma zone, destroying your ocean and giving my monster 500 extra points."

As the arena rumbled, the mighty structures that Damien's card had created tumbled in to the waves, and once more the mighty purple cloud stirred in the sky, calling Vandalgyon up in to it.

"Next order of business is to discard my invader of darkness in my hand to allow my vorse raider two attacks this turn, with my double attack spell card." Dreadroute grinned "Which means that you know what's next; Vandalgyon, destroy his Daedalus and vorse raider finish him!"

The two monsters leapt forwards towards Damien, holding their weapons at their sides. Quickly, Damien slammed the side of the rock with his foot, forcing it to drop a large boulder in to the centre of the arena, splitting Richard's chains and allowing him to float upwards.

As Richard watched, Vandalgyon chopped Daedalus in half, and Damien's life points dropped to 3600, but the assault wasn't over. The vorse raider spun his axe out, carving a great slash from his shoulder to his hip. The axe flew back, landed in the monster's hand again, and it switched the blade to its other hand, once more tossing the blade out at Damien, who was now beginning to fall from his pillar as his life points reached 1200.

The axe dug into his flesh on his un-hit shoulder and started to fly down diagonally, creating a large red 'x' across his torso. He let out a scream as his life points fell to zero, and he tumbled into the water below with a crash of water. The crowd sat in silence, surprised by the sudden change of events, and muttered to each other. The holograms faded, and Richard swam to where Damien's body had fallen.

He scooped him out of the water, and placed him on the beach. He was still breathing, and that's when Richard noticed something, and spun to Dreadroute, who was standing on the column still.

"Wait, why didn't you take Damien's body?"

"His body is reject stock. This body gives me all of the power I need to destroy everything in existence. Your friend shall be the outpost of destruction for my summoning!"

"You! You've hurt my friends for too long! It's time to duel, and this time, there's no way out for either of us!" Richard screamed, his duel disk snapping in to action. He ran towards Dreadroute, who smiled casually, as the two duellists were encompassed in a white glow.


	16. Legends of Duel Academy

_Authors Note: Okay, this is the final chapter. If you read it, please review my fanfiction, your comments will help. Sorry that it's quite long, I had to summarise everything. I have been trying to make my chapters shorter._

Chapter 16

When the light disappeared, Richard found himself on a large dome, with four great columns bursting from the edges. After a moment, Richard realised that he was standing on the school's roof, and saw great black scars from burns across it, which he assumed was from Rory's battle with Bone.

After examining his scenery, Richard saw Dreadroute sitting atop the enormous cannon-like mast Damien had pulled out upon Dreadroute's summoning. The demon leapt from it, slowly falling through the air, and landing on the other side of the roof, where Bone had stood only a couple of days ago before duelling Rory.

"I have a special surprise for you with this final duel, Richard." Dreadroute laughed "Every other person on the island will have this duel beamed in to your head through your point-of-view whilst they are unconscious. That means that every time you feel pain, they will too. So when you die, everyone dies."

After saying this, Dreadroute burst into a fit of uncontrollable evil laughter. Richard was unfazed though; he was still running off the adrenaline from his anger. When Dreadroute noticed that he wasn't scared, he stopped laughing, and muttered the single word "8000".

Richard did not need an explanation. He cracked his duel disk in to position and his life point total, relayed on a screen above his head, flickered to 8000.

"Now, your lord and master shall begin!" yelled Dreadroute "I summon my vorse raider in attack position!"

The large beast-like creature that so often played a part in Dreadroute's opening move appeared alongside him, its giant axe held high. It appeared on the screen with many parameters, noting its 1900 attack points.

"That ends my first turn." Dreadroute grinned, ecstatic with the prospect of being reunited with his body after thousands of years.

Richard drew, and smiled. "This deck has a trick in it for you Dreadroute." Richard began "Though you thought you would only be duelling my cards, which Damien undoubtedly filled you in on before changing to the light side, this deck has the power of five duellists in it! Now first up, I call upon the power of my friend and fellow Slifer, Syrus Truesdale; I summon Steamroid in attack position!"

As Richard revealed this to Dreadroute, his eyes widened and his jaw dropped. His initial strategy would now have to be reorganised. It did not matter though; the screens above showed him that the monster had only 1800 attack, which was not enough to take down his vorse raider.

Richard could sense what his opponent was thinking, and interrupted Dreadroute's pleasant bubble of thought. "I forgot to mention, my monster has a special effect! When it attacks, it gains 500 points!"

Once again, Dreadroute gasped, but it was too late, as the large mechanical train on Richard's field crashed in to vorse raider, and Dreadroute felt a surge of burning pain.

The screen above showed a picture of Dreadroute's face, and his 8000 total slipped to 7600. "And that ends my turn." Richard chuckled.

"Well, it just so happens that I know your monster's other effect!" Dreadroute interrupted "When I attack it, it loses 500 attack points. So I summon Shining abyss in attack mode and destroy your little steam engine!"

As the large blue creature appeared, and the screen noted its 1600 attack points, the monster spun forwards, destroying the steam train, and knocking Richard's life points to 7700.

"Now, I finish my turn with swords of revealing light. It stops you from attacking me for three turns. And by the time that that is up, the duel will be as good as over!"

Richard seemed completely unaffected by this. "Shining abyss? Sword of revealing light? Dready, I do not know what has brought this light out in you. Could it be that Rory's body has burnt the darkness from your soul?"

Dreadroute let out a roar of anger, but Richard wasn't paying attention. He had drawn his card already, and placed it in face-down defence position.

"That will do, Dready." Richard smirked, as his opponent continued to shake with anger.

Dreadroute steadied himself. "I must remain patient and calm." He muttered to himself "soon my body shall be mine again. I attack with shining abyss."

As the fairy moved forwards, Richard spoke to Dreadroute. "I guessed that you would beat the monster from Syrus, so meet another friend of mine's monster. Say hello to Des Koala from Chumley Huffington!"

The card flipped up to reveal a large fat red Koala that the fairy bounced from, lowering Dreadroute's life points to 7400, as the screens relayed the 1800 defence points.

"But that's not even the best part!" Richard yelled "Now it deals 300 damage to your life points for each card in your hand. Since you have 5 cards, you lose 1500 points!"

Dreadroute screamed as a purple light shone over him, and the screen rapidly spun, sending his life to 5900. The glow stopped, and he fell to the floor, barely able to lift himself. When he did, his face was scarred with deep red cuts and bruises.

"Never matter; this body shall not be mine for much longer anyway. All you are doing is hurting your friend. I summon my opticlops and end my turn."

Richard was stunned by this comment, and did not even notice as the large red demon appeared alongside Dreadroute's fairy, and the screens boasted its 1800 attack points.

Richard calmed himself, and drew his card. "Okay, I tribute my Des Koala to summon Sabre beetle. Then I set two cards face down, and since I cannot attack due to your swords, I end my turn."

Dreadroute raised an eyebrow at the large beetle with its glowing horn, as the screen showed him its 2400 points.

"Fine. I summon my mechanical chaser in attack position and end my turn." He murmured.

Richard was surprised by this tactic, as his monster still had more points than any of Dreadroute's, and in one more turn, he would be able to attack.

"Fine. I set one more card, and activate my first two! Both of which are rock bombardment. That means that by sending Charm of shabti and guardian statue from my deck to the graveyard, I can deal 1000 damage to your life points!"

Two massive boulders flew from over the edge of the school, crashing in to Dreadroute, who toppled backwards over the roof, tumbling in to the forest below. But Richard knew he was coming back. The screen still showed 4900 life points for his opponent, and as in the duel with Damien, Dreadroute hovered back to the arena.

"Next up, I tribute my sabre beetle to summon a new monster. You see, I went to my Slifer friends for cards, but I still didn't have enough monsters, so then I went to the Obelisks, who obliged to lending me some of their rare cards. So, courtesy of Chazz Princeton, say hello to the infernal incinerator!"

The building shook and a mighty black monster rose from the ground, covered in flames and spikes. The screen shook and quickly displayed 3200 attack points.

"And all I had to do was discard the rest of my hand. So Dreadroute, looks like you were wrong, your swords are going away now, and you haven't got a hope of winning!"

"You haven't noticed?" Dreadroute grinned, as a mighty wind shook the academy. "I have three monsters on my field! Now I tribute them to summon-"

"No!" yelled Richard, but the purple cloud of energy had already burst from Rory's mouth and into the air. The three monsters disappeared, and the cloud of energy flew to the tip of the mast, and reformed in to an enormous demon.

Dreadroute was covered in bones; twisted and jagged, sticking from his arms and chest. His skin was jet black, and his head was crowned with skulls, through which two large red eyes peered evilly. His mighty arms clasped a blade that easily stretched the size of the academy.

Richard stared up in terror at the thirty foot demon that had defeated Rory in a single attack, which dwarfed his incinerator as if it were an ant.

"I am free!" Dreadroute shrieked his voice now free of the traces of the people he had possessed. He now spoke in a dark, eerie tone, that rung across the academy. "And I attack your pitiful creature!"

Dreadroute flew through the air, slamming his sword across the roof, and crushing Richard's monster. Richard barely had time to jump to the closest pillar before the roof beneath him collapsed.

He pulled himself on to the pillar, collapsing in pain. He stared up at his opponent's field, to see Dreadroute hovering above him laughing evilly in his true form.

"You see, mortal, I have a special effect. I half the attack of all other monsters on the field, not to mention that I have 4000 points of my own!"

Richard was terrified, and looked at the screen, which barely hung on. He had been lowered to 5300 life points by the last attack, and doubted he would last much longer.

"Now I set one more card and end my turn. You shall not defeat me now mortal!"

"Okay." Richard muttered, picking up a single card, as his monster had destroyed the rest of his hand. "I activate my face-down card, jar of greed! It lets me draw another card."

He drew a second card from his deck, though he knew that his attempts were pathetic. He looked down at his card, pot of greed, and remembered what seemed like a millennium ago, his duel against Rory, and how the multiple pots of greeds had irritated him.

He smiled, and realised that there was still hope. "I activate pot of greed!" he yelled, drawing two more cards, and grinning at them. "Okay, I special summon my megarock dragon by removing from play guardian statue! But I'm not done, I tribute it for judge man!"

"Your feeble creatures are nothing compared to my awesome power. Your monster shall recede in to darkness!" Dreadroute stated, as the judge man appeared, and its 2200 attack points lit the screen above it.

"Don't underestimate my judge man!" Richard smiled "I activate megamorph on you! It halves your attack points! Now I attack with Judge man!"

Dreadroute shrank slightly, as the tall, club-swinging man leapt at him. But just as he was about to hit him, Dreadroute yelled out.

"I activate Mystical space typhoon!" he sniggered "It destroys megamorph, and since you're still attacking, you lose your monster, as well as life points!"

Richard gasped, and watched as Dreadroute chopped his monster in half, and a black beam shot from the sword, hitting him directly, and shattering the pillar he was standing on's connection with the roof.

He had no time to see his life points hit 3500, all he could do is run to the edge of the pillar and jump, wrapping his arms around Dreadroute's summoning mast. He pulled his legs around it and climbed on to the top, which barely had room for him to stand, without toppling downwards to his death.

"I set one card face-down, and end my turn." He muttered, noticing that there was now nothing between him and Dreadroute.

"Well, Richard Capricorn, you played the game well, but you have no more monsters to fall before you. It is time to admit defeat, and fall in to shadow. You have only 3500 life points, and I have 4000 attack. Now, I attack directly. Any last words?"

"Yes! Activate Trap!" Richard Roared, as his card rose, and a large tube appeared in front of Dreadroute's beam. "My Magical cylinders bounce your attack back at your own life points, lowering you to 900 points!"

The beam entered a second tube, firing back at Dreadroute, who cried out in anger. "I shall not allow you to survive any further! I shall defeat you with my next attack!"

Richard knew that if Dreadroute could stay on the field for one more turn, his opponent would be correct. If he didn't dispose of his foe now, the game would be over. He drew his card, and looked down at it.

"I activate card of sanctity! By removing all of the cards on my field from play, which is none, I can draw two new cards."

He looked down at his new cards, and smiled. His Dreadroute defeating strategy could now begin!

"Now for the final duellist that this deck hails. I summon elemental hero wildheart, who comes directly from Jaden Yuki! And next I activate my wild half card!"

Richard smiled, holding his spell card up, as the tribal native appeared beside him.

"No card can defeat me!" Dreadroute laughed "You shall fall this turn, boy!"

"I beg to differ! My Wild half card halves your attack, and makes two of you, meaning that because of your own effect, now that you are split, both tokens are lowered to 500 attack!"

"But your creature loses attack as well." Dreadroute laughed "Close, but not close enough."

"Unfortunately for you, my monster only loses points for one of your tokens, so it still has 750 points! Now attack and destroy him, Wildheart!"

As Dreadroute split in to two smaller bodies, the hero leapt in to the air, tossing its sword at one of the two demons. The ghoul shrieked, before exploding, and Dreadroute's life points dropping to 650.

"Now, I end my turn." Richard muttered "It all goes down to your move now, Dready. It's make or break time."

"I start by setting a card and then I use share the pain!" The demon roared, vanishing in to nothingness. "It destroys my body to destroy one of your monsters, leaving you unguarded!"

Wildheart vanished, but Richard looked confused "Wait, you don't have a body anymore!"

"Oh, I disagree. That fool Rory has one of the greatest forms I could ever need. By banishing my old body forever, as well as that pathetic light monster shining abyss, which I had to include in my deck for my ultimate plan, I can summon the mighty Chaos Emperor Dragon – Envoy of the end!"

Richard's eyes widened, and the almighty dragon that used to be the key card in Rory's deck flew from the shadows above the academy. The purple cloud of dust appeared again, wrapping around the enormous dragon, and turning its scales jet black. Its sharp white markings pressed outwards, and its claws grew until they were metres long.

Its eyes opened, to reveal the large, red, soulless eyes of Dreadroute, who had now taken refuge in its body. "I shall attack you directly, leaving you with only 500 points!" As he said this, he launched a giant black fireball from his blade-edged mouth, which crashed in to Richard, burning the mast on which he stood.

He flew to the tip of the mast, clinging to it with a single hand. His counter had hit 500, but it wouldn't matter soon, as he was about to fall to his death below.

Just when he thought it was as bad as it could get, the pillar began to fall downwards, away from the roof. He was certain of it now, he was going to die.

As the pillar was splitting from the roof, however, a large rope, the kind used by ninjas, wrapped around the mast, pulling it back upwards. Then, a dragon made out of pure bone flew beneath Richard, and took him to the edge of the roof.

Richard recognised the monsters as white ninja and Curse of dragon, and was delighted to see the boy with them on his duel disk, Rory. His friend had awoken just in time to save him, and he would repay the debt by finishing the evil demon before them.

"Dreadroute! You're about to see the true power of teamwork! It's time to finish this duel!"

"Hehehe. Mortal. Just because you survived an attack does not mean that you can win this duel. And even if you can, I have linked my soul to your saviour's. So if you kill me, he shall die also. You have to lose."

Richard's eyes were unfocused, and he stood staring in to space, shocked by this sudden twist in the duel. He drew without paying attention, and looked down at his new card.

Once more, memories returned at the sight of his second pot of greed. He had almost forgotten that all three that he had used against Rory were in this deck.

"I activate my second pot of greed," Richard said, drawing two cards "and my third!"

"What are you, a two-year old?" Questioned Dreadroute in fury.

"No, I'm a winner!" Richard said, looking at the three cards in front of him. "And it appears that the heart of the cards is with me, as I just drew the three cards I needed. I'll start with snatch steal, and take over your dragon."

As the dragon shot to Richard, in between the two boys, the purple mist was ejected from it, and reformed in to a teenage boy's shape, more specifically, Rory's shape.

"If you attack me, he dies too!" he reminded Richard, his dark voice the only difference between the two Rory's.

Richard laughed, ignoring this, which startled Dreadroute, who had relied on the fact that Richard would not attack "I don't plan to attack with the dragon. I activate the second card I drew, polymerization! This allows me to fuse the Gaia the fierce knight in my hand with my chaos emperor dragon, to summon the almighty CHAOS EMPEROR KNIGHT!"

As Richard said the name of his new monster, his voice boomed as loud as a fog horn, ripping Dreadroute's cloud out of Rory's form, and making him turn back in to a smaller version of his demonic form.

Meanwhile, the large knight landed on the field, combining with the stolen Emperor dragon. They shimmered, as their atoms stuck together, until the light was unbelievably strong, and a large silver armoured, blue-skinned knight stood in between Rory and Richard.

Its armour covered most of its body, leaving only slight parts of its blue skin visible. In one of its hands was an enormous silver sword, with dragons' claws covering it. The monster lifted its sword, and let out an enormous roar.

"Damien gave me this card as a method to defeat you, Dreadroute. And he said that it could oust your powers from Rory's body forever! So, Let's find out if he was right! Now my monster, attack with blade of the emperors!"

As the creature flew at Dreadroute, with enormous blue wings, he lifted his face-down card. "I activate my call of the haunted! It returns Dark Dreadroute to my field! Sorry, but you just weren't strong enough!"

The demon appeared on the field, but the knight did not stop its charge. "I'm sorry, Dreadroute, my chaos emperor knight starts with 3300 attack, but he gains 100 points for every card in each player's graveyard, and 300 for each removed from play! Now, in our combined graveyards, there are 19 cards, and there are 4 cards removed from the game, so my monster now has a total of 6400 attack points, which can fry your monster and your life force.

The knight flew forwards, and Dreadroute emitted an enormous cry, as its blade plunged in to him, and he was blasted in to a million pieces. His scream echoed one final time, and then it was gone. Dreadroute was finally destroyed.

"And so, for their amazing duel against the demon Dreadroute, I now announce that Richard Capricorn and Rory Lionheart shall both enter Obelisk blue dorm!" Crowler squeaked, as the two boys, now the best of friends, put on their new blue blazers.

"So, Richard," Rory grinned "Looks like we defeated the four emissaries, and Dreadroute, and saved the world!"

"Yeah, couldn't have done it without you, Ror!"

"Now we go back to school and tests and lessons. Great in all its mediocrity!"

Richard laughed. "By the way, I think that this would fit better in your deck."

Rory took the card which had finally eradicated Dreadroute from existence.

"I can't take this! It was given to you! You should keep it!"

"I'm sorry, but I have to agree with Richard." The third of the friends said, arriving from down the corridor.

"Thank you, Damien!" Richard said, clapping his new friend on the back as he got to them. "Wow, never thought I'd ay that!"

The friends laughed at this, smiling as the day drew to an end. The day that had lasted longer than any other day. The day of Dreadroute. The week of the emissaries. The first semester of school. And there would be more adventures. More challenges that would test Richard and Rory. More horrific duels, and more dark creatures.

But now that their decks were perfected, could the darkness reach them? And surely, no matter how hard the trials, nothing would pierce the now unstoppable friendship of Richard Capricorn and Rory Lionheart.

_I hope you enjoyed the fanfiction as much as me, I will be writing the sequel to this fanfiction, shadows of duel academy, shortly, and hope that you continue to read my work. Thanks for the reviews and views. Seos Kanennth._

Shadows of Duel academy storyid3739026


	17. Duellist Card Lists

Legends of Duel academy Duellist Card Lists

Rory

Chaos Emperor Dragon – Envoy of the end

_(Given to Rory by Yugi)_

White ninja

Mystic clown

De-spell

La Jinn, Mystical genie of the lamp

Dian Keto the cure master

Fissure

Ordeal of a traveller

Opticlops

Level Conversion lab

Invader of Darkness

Mystical space typhoon

Hinotama

Shining abyss

Waboku

Soul release

Swordstalker

Monster reincarnation

Negate attack

Curse of dragon

Gift of the martyr

Spellbinding circle

Vorse raider

Shrink

Disciple of the forbidden spell

Draining shield

Luminous Spark

Richard

Megarock dragon

Pot of greed X3

Charm of shabti

Sabre beetle

Poison mummy

Buster rancher

Rock bombardment X3

Destroyer golem

Guardian statue

Golem sentry

The transmigration prophecy

Lost guardian

Return from the different dimension

United we stand

Judge man

Double attack

Gaia the fierce knight

Negate attack

Creature swap

Battle ox

Fissure

Dian keto the cure master

Ultimate offering

Megamorph

Gift of the martyr

Linear acceleration cannon

De-spell

Royal keeper

Alien infiltrator

Waboku

Collected power

Call of the haunted

Invigoration

Premature burial

Rod of the mind's eye

AFTER COMBINING DECKS

Steamroid

Des Koala

Jar of Greed

Infernal Incinerator

Magical Cylinders

Card of sanctity

Elemental hero Wildheart

Wild half

Snatch steal

Polymerization

Chaos Emperor Knight

_(Given by Damien, given to Rory after fanfiction 1)_

Damien

Mother grizzly

7 Coloured fish

A legendary Ocean

Call of the haunted

Divine Wrath

Treeborn Frog

Big Wave Small Wave

Ocean Dragon Lord – Neo Daedalus

Unshaven Angler

Levia Dragon – Daedalus

Black Pendant

Dreadroute

INITIAL CARDS

Vorse Raider

Chthonian Soldier X2

Element soldier

Shrink

Negate attack

Element Saurus

Nitro Unit

Nightmare steelcage

The Fiend Megacyber

D.D. Trainer

Summoned Skull

Black Pendant

AFTER POSSESSING CROWLER

Mechanical Chaser X2

Divine Wrath

Waboku

Cyber jar

Mystic Clown

Spear Cretin

Memory Crusher

Double coston

AFTER POSSESSING ZANE

Drillago

Limiter removal

Opticlops

Dian keto the cure master

Damage Condenser

Dark Ruler Vandalgyon

Mystic Plasma Zone

Dark Jeroid

Magical cylinders

Monster Reborn

Dark Dreadroute

AFTER POSSESSING RORY

Solemn Judgement

Draining shield

Invader of Darkness

Double attack

Wolf

Silver Fang X3

Forest

Graceful charity

Fenrir X2

Mother grizzly X2

Advanced Ritual Art

Lycanthrope

Fissure

Dark Hole

Bone

Skull servant X3

Next to be lost

Graceful charity

King of skull servants X3

Generation shift

Call of the haunted

Vampire Lord

Violet Crystal

Spirit

Elemental Hero Clayman

Mucus Yolk

Axe of Despair X2

Waboku


End file.
